


The Hinges of Human Sympathies

by BrunetteAuthorette99



Series: The Hinges of Human Sympathies [1]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: (but he's also the World's Biggest Sap when it comes to Will Graham), (naturally this complicates things when it comes time for revenge), (so in other words he's a manipulative possessive scary-as-fuck cannibalistic serial killer), Abigail Keeps Getting Caught in the Middle of Things, Abigail Lives, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Codependency, Episode Fix-It: s02e13 Mizumono, Episode: s02e13 Mizumono, Family Dinners, Fresh Meat Friday, Gen, Hannibal Eats His Feelings, Hannibal Season 02 Spoilers, Hannibal is Hannibal, Hopeful Ending, Inflammatory and Suggestive TattleCrime Articles, Interrogation, Knives, Laying On the Pretentious Mythological Subtext Real Thick BECAUSE I CAN, M/M, Manipulative Hannibal, Mastermind Hannibal... Sort Of, Murder Family, Sitting Around and Talking, Talking About Teacups, Travel, Trust Issues, Unconventional Families, Weird Romance, Will is Bitter and a Bit of a Shit, Will is SO done, implied Hannigram
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-24
Updated: 2016-10-16
Packaged: 2018-05-03 06:40:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 29,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5280560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrunetteAuthorette99/pseuds/BrunetteAuthorette99
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>"Love and death are the great hinges on which all human sympathies turn. What we do for ourselves dies with us. What we do for others lives beyond us."</em>
</p><p>Will confesses everything when he calls to warn Hannibal, Hannibal's resolve wavers enough for him to make a fateful choice, and Abigail is once again caught up in the storm. </p><p>Almost nothing goes as planned — and yet, just like one of Hannibal's teacups, everything comes back together in the end.</p><p>* * *</p><p>An alternate course of events for "Mizumono," as narrated by Abigail Hobbs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Fight and Flight

**Author's Note:**

> ... Apparently, I decided that my first year of college would be a great time to become obsessed with a TV show, and that TV show just happened to be _Hannibal_. (Admittedly, I started watching after it got canceled, but better late than never, right?) Naturally, I devoured (heh) that and anything else _Hannibal_ -related (or Hannigram-related or Murder Family-related) pretty quickly - and naturally, I got _reeeaaally_ emotional about that Season 2 finale.
> 
> So really, it was only a matter of time before I wrote my own "Mizumono" denial fic. It started out as a one-shot, but it's already gotten massively out-of-control lengthwise - not that I mind, of course. (o´ω｀o) 
> 
> In any case, enjoy!

She remembers all too clearly how the silence finally breaks.

The sound of the rain thudding against the windows and battering at the roof is so constant, so relentless, it takes her a few seconds to realize that the phone is ringing. The faint memory of a different phone ringing in a different kitchen keeps her rooted to the floor with dread and anticipation as Hannibal answers the phone.

"Hello?" A polite nothing, but the word seems clipped, expectant.

Abigail watches him closely, vainly hoping for some change in his expression or demeanor that would let her in, let her know what was going on behind the facade.

For once, she is not disappointed.

A sudden flood of indistinct, frantic murmuring flows from the receiver, and Hannibal goes completely still, muscles coiling and stiffening. He listens silently as the caller keeps talking, pouring out words drowned out by distance and the rain, and she keeps watching, anticipation lessening and dread growing.

His eyes, darker than usual in the low light of the kitchen, flick over to her where she stands frozen at the kitchen island and hold her gaze. Staring into them, the first word that leaps to Abigail’s mind is _indecision_ , and that startles her and scares her.

Whatever could rattle Hannibal Lecter could bring the world crumbling down.

Just as quickly, his gaze shifts. "I know," he says quietly, cutting off the noise at the end of the line. "I know everything, Will."

Her eyes widen at the old, but familiar name.

"Where are you now?" he asks. If she hadn’t known any better, she would have thought his voice almost urgent.

A pause. Hannibal seems to weigh his words, scales hanging in the air. Then: "Go to where the Ripper made his gallery. Tell me what you see."

With that, he hangs up the phone with a _click._ She inhales unsteadily, the pounding of the rain echoing the blood pumping in her ear.

"Abigail."

The rest of her breath sucks in with a quiet gasp.

"Go upstairs and pack your things." His voice is calm, as if trying to soothe a spooked animal. "One bag only. Take only what you cannot live without."

"What’s going on?" she asks, unable to keep the trepidation out of her voice. "Where are we going?"

Hannibal finally turns to her, his face carefully neutral again. "The FBI has issued a warrant for Will’s arrest," he says simply. "We are leaving before they decide to turn their attention here."

"What about Will?" she presses, heart climbing in her throat.

"We are meeting him." The corners of his mouth soften; it’s the closest thing to a real smile she’s seen on him, but there is still a tightness, a pain to it. "It is important that we remain together. Look after each other." The smile does not reach his eyes, dark and unfathomable. "Protect each other."

She doesn’t know what to say to that. If she’s being honest with herself, she doesn’t think that Hannibal knows what it means to truly protect someone — not out of self-interest or curiosity, but affection.

"Go and pack, Abigail." His voice is a little firmer now. "We mustn’t keep Will waiting."

 

It is the most vulnerable she has ever seen Will, even when his mysterious sickness clawed at his brain and left him helpless in the wake of his extreme empathy. His expression when she steps out of the shadows inside the abandoned observatory is jarring, and for a moment, she is inexplicably terrified before she realizes that it is not anger on his face upon seeing her, but pure shock.

He stares at her for a long time, the pallor of his skin and the rain streaking down his face from his soaked hair gleaming in the dim chamber; in this lighting, he looks almost unchanged from when she last saw him: sweating, shaking, snarling. But he doesn’t look threatening now. He just looks lost.

Tearing his gaze away from her, Will looks aside at Hannibal, almost frantic, and it suddenly strikes her that he thinks she isn’t there in the flesh: just another hallucination conjured by his fractured mind.

Hannibal nods.

Will looks back, his eyes widening and shining as he blinks back tears. " _Abigail?"_ he whispers, choked.

She tries to smile, but the cold and her stress makes it weak. "Hi, Will."

He crosses to her and wraps his arms around her, pulling her into an unexpectedly strong hug. After a moment, she awkwardly curls her arms around him and leans her head against his chest, feeling his panicked heartbeat slow and stabilize. She suddenly realizes that this is the first human contact besides Hannibal she’s had in months, and her fingers dig into his wet coat, clinging to it like a lifeline.

"How?" he asks, his voice cracking. " _How?"_

"The teacup I’ve shattered has come together." Hannibal’s voice is almost too even, too calm. "A place has been made once more in the world for Abigail. A place has been made for all of us to be together."

Abigail feels cold fingers against the side of her head and colder air as her hair is moved away from where her ear used to be, and she hears Will’s quiet, but sharp intake of breath. He loosens his hold on her to look at Hannibal, his gaze hardening.

"Now is not the time for explanations," Hannibal says before Will can open his mouth. "By now, the FBI will have arrived at your house and Jack at mine, and they will see that we have fled. We must act quickly."

"And I suppose you have a plan?" There is a dryness to his words — something of the Will she remembers — but more of a quiet bitterness.

Hannibal approaches them, and Abigail notices a strange gleam in his eyes. "I am always prepared, Will."

He moves frighteningly fast. In an instant, Will is yanked away from her and a choked scream escapes her throat as Hannibal’s arms snake around Will’s waist and neck and hold him fast, lifting him nearly off his feet.

"Forgive me, Will," Hannibal murmurs, his voice still measured and calm even as his arm presses down on Will’s neck. "I can no longer take chances. Fool me once —"

Gasping, eyes wide with sudden panic, Will kicks wildly and tries to pry Hannibal’s hands off of him, but his struggling soon becomes more feeble until he goes almost completely limp, slumping backwards. Hannibal does not let him fall, instead bending down with Will’s body still cradled in his arms and then, almost gently, laying him down on the tile floor.

Heart leaping into her throat, Abigail drops to her knees besides Will and reaches out for one of his wrists, but Hannibal’s fingers find Will’s pulse before hers can.

"Don’t worry, Abigail. He will be all right." He straightens up, eerily casual for a man who just choked someone into unconsciousness.

"I don’t understand," she says, and she hates how very small and childish her voice sounds. "I thought you said once that Will could be trusted."

Hannibal pauses, his eyes shifting away from her and back to Will’s still, pale face, and something cracks in the mask he wears when he does.

"Once Will could be trusted," he agrees. He does not make eye contact, his gaze still fixed on Will, and this minor breach of etiquette surprises her. "But you and I both know that Jack Crawford cannot be."

She swallowed. Considering his juvenile attempts at mashing the gory puzzle pieces of Garret Jacob Hobbs’ crimes together, she hadn’t thought the head of the BAU would be as large of a threat to her, but somehow, even with all his bluster and fumbling, Crawford had glimpsed the piece she’d tried so hard to hide from everyone — Dr. Bloom, Hannibal, but Will most of all.

How had he felt when he realized that the daughter of the man he’d killed, the daughter he’d tried to look after and protect like she was his own child, should have gotten one of those nine bullets in her chest?

It comes to her then. "Will and Agent Crawford are working together? To — to do what? To — _catch you?"_ she finishes, disbelieving.

Then again, there were all the other serial killers the FBI had sought in vain, all the other monsters in human’s clothing; those two had caught them all, sooner or later. The Chesapeake Ripper — _no, Hannibal Lecter,_ she thought _—_ was just the one who’d held out the longest; she didn’t have any trouble imagining that Agent Crawford was more than a little frustrated about that particular failure.

But _Will?_

Hannibal exhales, a small puff of breath turning cloudy in the frigid air, that same fragmented expression still on his face. Overhead, rain continues to thud down on the roof of the observatory.

"I thought you said that it was important for us to remain together," she persists. "Look after each other, _protect_ each other —" Her voice breaks.

"It is," he says, taking her hand, the one that had fallen by Will’s limp wrist, and guiding her to her feet. His hand is warm with life, but she sees that the shards of his mask have reformed into one of deathly cold determination. "And we will."

She does not move. Her gaze is still on Will.

"I am on my honor to look after you, Abigail," he says, almost gently, as he clasps her hand in both of his and looks her in the eye. His maroon eyes are black and glittering in the low light. "You must look after me as well. You must trust me."

Abigail can’t argue with that. After all, what choice does she have — _really?_

_Better the devil I know, I suppose,_ she thinks morbidly as Hannibal lets go of her hands and bends down to gather up Will in his arms.

 

Outside the rain-streaked window, the night rushes by in a steady stream of dark and rain. Within, in the back seat of Hannibal’s Bentley, Abigail’s eyelids flutter open and closed, but her racing thoughts don’t let her fall asleep.

She doesn’t know where they’re going, and she doesn’t want to ask. Probably somewhere by plane, judging by the single bag resting on her lap ( _no need to check luggage with only a carry-on_ ), but Hannibal had changed the license plate on the Bentley before they left, so they probably had a ways to go by car first.

For a brief moment, she wonders where they’ll go, and a whirlwind of glossy travel brochures and National Geographic photographs twirls through her mind. Europe, most likely — any one of those cities hundreds of years old that are only ever referred to by their name because everyone knows what country they’re in. In any case, she can’t see Hannibal in his three-piece suits anywhere south of the equator — or anywhere more than an hour from an opera house or a symphony hall.

And then her thoughts turn to Will, and she thinks that someone like him, who can see so keenly into the hearts and minds of others, would never be comfortable in the big and bright cities Hannibal loves. Maybe in a town too small to go on a map, or somewhere in the countryside where the trees outnumbered the people. She imagines that after all he’s seen, all he’s _been_ , he’d like the quiet.

She doesn’t think about where she’d like to go. It’s been too long since she truly _lived_ anywhere — thanks to _them_.

Abigail’s unfocused gaze goes to the front of the car, the washed-out headlights illuminating the deserted road outside and throwing everything inside into shadows. Hannibal is driving just over the speed limit, his hold on the wheel relaxed. Will is buckled into the passenger’s seat, his head leaning on the car door. The radio is playing some slow, mournful string piece; even though she still has her coat and gloves on, she feels chills prickling over her skin.

Will stirs, and his head lolls to the other side, against his shoulder, and Hannibal glances over. He reaches out, fingers threading through the other man’s curls as he cups Will’s skull, and nudges his head upright again. It’s hard to tell in this light, but she thinks that Hannibal’s expression seems softer, less guarded — but still uncertain.

Abigail finally gives in to weariness and lets her eyelids fall. The last thing she sees before the rain lulls her to sleep is Hannibal placing his hand back on the steering wheel, his eyes lingering on Will for a moment longer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Musical inspiration for this chapter (and the song that is meant to be playing on the radio in the end) was ["Peer Gynt Suite No. 1, Op. 46: II. Aase's Death (Andante Doloroso)" by Edvard Grieg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AB4m885sTeE) \- which you might recognize as the music playing during _that one scene_ in "Aperitivo." (I watched the episode after I wrote the chapter, so it was a bit of a strange coincidence.)
> 
> Anyway, happy holidays to you all, and I will be back with another chapter next week!


	2. Fight and Flight, Continued

Much of their journey out of the country passes like a dream: ephemeral, fading fast the harder she tries to recall it, and yet, strangely vivid. And in the end, it is that vividness of what she _does_ remember — those startlingly clear images that flash through her tired mind like images on a slide viewer — that convinces Abigail that she is not dreaming after all.

(She wonders for a moment if Hannibal had drugged her somehow, but dismisses it quickly. After all, she’s been drugged before by his hand, and she thinks she’d recognize it if it happened again — or _hopes_ she would, at least.)

More than anything else — the disembodied voice on the intercom ringing through the near-deserted terminal, the cracks in the fake leather of the airplane seats, the chill in the recycled air of the cabin — she remembers her fear. She remembers how it had gripped her heart like a vise as she went through security with the fake passport and driver’s license that Hannibal had given her, as she waited at the gate and prayed that the news channel on the TV overhead wouldn’t show any of their pictures, as she kept her nose buried in the laminated safety pamphlet as what passengers there were rummaged in the overhead bins and worked their way to their seats. She remembers how she doesn’t even dare to breathe until the plane has lifted off of the runway, how she doesn’t say a word until the neon seatbelt sign above her head is switched off. Most of all, she remembers how she can’t even sleep, despite how exhausted she is.

No drug could have made her feel that keen a panic — or tenseness.

 

Will wakes up during the drive to the airport. Much to Abigail’s relief, Hannibal lets him stay conscious, but during their short wait at the gate, he offers the other man some Valium — ostensibly to help him sleep during the flight, but given past experience, she doubts that the pills are actually what Hannibal says they are.

"Oh, don’t worry, Dr. Lecter," Will mutters, slouching back against Hannibal’s suitcase almost petulantly; the only thing he’d brought with him was his jacket. "It’s a little late for me to escape."

She is seated between them on the plane, unwittingly caught in the middle of their silent war, and it does nothing to ease her frayed nerves. Hannibal and Will barely speak to each other for the entirety of the flight, and when they do, their exchanges are terse, brusque, and decidedly passive-aggressive — on Will’s end, at least. Hannibal remains the picture of courtesy, but judging by the tightness of his mouth, he is hardly unaffected by Will’s rudeness.

Personally, Abigail thinks that this “silent treatment” is more than a little childish, even ridiculous. She almost tells them so, but then she reconsiders giving etiquette lectures to a serial killer and a man who can identify with serial killers.

(Drinking plenty of water helps — not only does it keep her hydrated and somewhat refreshed, it also allows for frequent bathroom breaks and a few blissful moments away from the brewing storm.)

 

Their flight arrives in Reykjavík as dawn breaks over the North Atlantic. As the plane descends, Abigail marvels at how vibrant the colored rooftops are in the brilliance of the golden sunrise, and the sight lifts her spirits a little.

They have enough time during their layover to catch a shuttle going from the airport to Kringlan, and Abigail can’t help but be impressed at how spacious and full of light the mall is, and at the staggering amount and variety of stores there. She stops gaping long enough to take the króna that Hannibal is distributing and to hurriedly attempt to memorize the few basic Icelandic phrases he teaches to her and Will before she splits off from the two of them to go and find a store that’s to her taste.

When they take the shuttle back to the airport two hours later, they look more like fashionable travelers than wanted fugitives. Abigail has to admit that anyone who’d known them in Baltimore would be hard-pressed to recognize them now; Hannibal especially is a complete stranger in a leather jacket and a fleece pullover that somehow sit on him as well as one of his suits. But even though no one is probably looking for her, a girl long presumed dead and eaten, she feels oddly exposed, even in something as modest as a scarf and sweater dress with knit leggings and ankle boots to shield her skin from the cold.

( _It’s the color,_ she mentally decides, fingering the sleeve of her dress: wool the color of mustard. She can’t remember the last time she wore something this bright, but then again, she can’t remember the last time she shopped for her own clothes.)

They also buy a new suitcase for their old clothes, and it is put into Will’s keeping. That combined with his charcoal cardigan and his combed-back hair makes him look startlingly sophisticated, more urbane —

 _More like Hannibal,_ she realizes, and none of her layers can keep out the chill that rushes over her skin at that thought.

 

"Abigail?"

She shifts her unfocused gaze from the clouds floating outside the cabin window to the seat beside her, to Will. Mercifully, their seats had been split up for this flight, in accordance with the identities on the second set of false passports; judging by their shared surnames, Abigail is supposed to be Will’s daughter.

After all that Hannibal’s done, it seems like a particularly cruel joke.

"Are you… all right?" he asks, his brow furrowing in concern. Up close, in better lighting, she can see the dark circles under his eyes more clearly.

She nods. She doesn’t know if he’s asking specifically about their escape, or about her captivity, but she figures that it would be better to set his mind at ease.

He exhales, running a hand through his hair; some of the curls have started to creep back into place. "Good," he manages. "That’s, uh, good."

"What about you?" she ventures.

Will’s expression goes from worry to confusion to frustration. "Hell if I know," he says quietly, fingers drumming on the arm rest.

"Did you know?" she asks. "Did you know that — that we were leaving together?"

He leans his head back and sighs. "I _thought_ I knew what Hannibal and I were planning. But…" His sentence trails off as he avoids her eyes. "I didn’t know that you were part of those plans."

"Because you thought I was dead," she finishes.

His mouth twists, pained. "I thought that it was me," he confesses, his voice low and broken. "And then I was so _sure_ that Hannibal had —"

She swallows. "Well, he _did_ intend to make it look that way," she says tentatively, remembering the staging of her death in her old kitchen, the way her blood had sprayed over the tile like some infernal fountain.

"Just as he _intended_ to choke me unconscious and give me no other alternative than to leave the country for God knows where?" he returns, his tone sharp, but bitter. "Was there a purpose in that, too, or did he do it just because his sense of drama demanded it?"

Abigail glances around nervously; even though Hannibal is sitting at least five rows ahead of them, she can’t help but feel like he can hear every word. "I don’t know," she finally says. "But I think you might."

He looks back at her, confused again. "What do you mean?"

"He doesn’t think you can be trusted any more." She inhales shakily. "Because you were working with Agent Crawford."

His expression crumbles ever so slowly, and it makes her heart ache. "But I called him," he says, his voice no more than a whisper. "I told him everything. I told him to run, to leave without me —"

"Why?" she asks.

Will smiles, but it is strained and twisted and his lips are trembling. "I don’t know." He sighs heavily, looking down at his fists, now clenched around his discarded cardigan. "But… I’m beginning to think I shouldn’t have."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The pictures that inspired [Hannibal's](https://www.pinterest.com/pin/10766486582490487/), [Will's](http://www.justjared.com/photo-gallery/2941794/hugh-dancy-covers-august-man-malaysia-september-2013-05/), and [Abigail's](http://www.beautytipsmart.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/How-To-Wear-A-Scarf-With-A-Sweater-Dress-For-Girls-7-243x300.jpg) outfits — I couldn't find very many pictures of Kacey Rohl, so I had to make do with a random model who could resemble her from a distance.


	3. Trust Issues

“What comes next?”

Hearing Will’s voice, Abigail tears her gaze away from the hotel window, away from the sunset trickling off the city’s rooftops like dye, and turns around in her seat back towards him. She realizes then (with no small amount of surprise) that he is not speaking to her, but rather to Hannibal, laying out the covered plates on what passed for a dinner table in their room. Abigail almost smiles in anticipation of getting to witness such a known gourmet eating room service, but the tightness of Will’s shoulders and the frown etching itself into his brow make her think better of it.

“We’ll leave the day after tomorrow.” Hannibal takes some paper napkins from the dispenser on the table, folds them as if they were fine linen, and tucks them under the silverware. “While we must act quickly to evade the FBI, we must take care to not move too quickly.”

Will shrugs stiffly, obviously irked at the other’s logic. “What kind of tourist would only spend one afternoon in a country before jetting off to a new one?” he asks of no one in particular.

Hannibal nods, seemingly pleased that Will is following his train of thought. “Switching passports should buy us some time, but Jack is nothing if not persistent.”He seats himself at the table, next to Abigail and across from Will, in a plush armchair borrowed from the corner of the room. “He will not accept that you and I have simply vanished with no explanation.”

“Neither of us are presumed dead.” Will’s tone is dark, but his bitterness is not for her. “I’d say that helps our escape, too.”

Hannibal doesn’t so much as blink, lifting the cover off of his plate with a practiced flourish; he has ordered some kind of steak that is most definitely on the rare side. “The FBI is fixated on looking for two men. In doing so, two men and a young woman might pass on the periphery of their narrowed vision.”

“Convenient,” Will says flatly. He does not move to uncover his food.

Abigail swallows uncomfortably.

Hannibal chooses to ignore that comment outright. “We’ll be taking a ferry across the Irish Sea to Wales.” Reaching for the opened bottle of wine, he pours some of it in Will’s glass and then his own; Abigail shakes her head when he reaches for her glass. “I thought you’d rather that over another plane flight.”

“I’d rather be conscious on a boat than conscious on a plane, yes.” Will, Abigail decides, is _really_ pushing his luck with that snippy tone. “Or unconscious in a car.”

Now Hannibal pauses. “You find fault in our travel plans?”

“Just the part where you can’t decide whether I’m a hostage or not.” Will is making no effort to disguise his comments with charming sarcasm now; he stares straight at Hannibal, mouth thin.

The other steadily holds his gaze. “It was impossible for me to determine your motivations for calling, Will. I had to act with caution,” he finally says, and for a moment, she thinks he almost sounds honest. “If I erred, you must forgive my earlier conduct.”

“Must I?” Will asks darkly.

Hannibal pauses, considering his words. “Not long ago, I was told that one cannot choose forgiveness for themselves — forgiveness simply happens,” he says thoughtfully. “Against all odds, forgiveness came upon me. It may yet come to you.”

“For this?” Will doesn’t sound angry now: just tired. “Or for everything else?”

Hannibal tilts his head slightly. “I suspect you will have to see that for yourself.”

Looking down at her plate, Abigail uncovers her salad and seafood chowder and starts eating without a word. The sunset is reflected for a moment in the shiny cover, and then it winks out.

 

The sea air is cold and raw on her face as she leans on the rail — even bundled up in a thick wool sweater, with a hat and mittens as well, the wind still seems to push through the fibers and folds of her clothing, leaving her chilled down to the bone. While Abigail has to admit that being at sea on a cloudy winter day is nowhere near as bad as an average Minnesota winter ( _and saltwater smells better than snowblower fumes_ ), she at least hopes that wherever they’re going, it’s warmer than this.

“How far are we going?” she asks Hannibal. There are very few people on the deck besides them — a couple talking and giggling up near the prow, a few grizzled men passing a flask amongst themselves, a middle-aged woman swathed in a scarf and taking pictures of the choppy waves — and none of them are paying attention to them, but she lowers her voice anyway.

“As far as we have to go.” A hint of a smile, anticipating and amused. “We may have to lead the FBI on quite the merry chase before they tire.”

“So we keep doing this?” she asks, disbelieving. “Go from country to country, switching identities and changing our appearances and hoping no one recognizes us?”

“For a time,” he answers. “It is only the beginning of your Grand Tour, Abigail.” When she frowns, confused, he proceeds to explain. “In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, it was customary for young aristocrats to travel abroad in Europe for months, or even years: to France, to Germany, but especially to Italy. It was a rite of passage in its day — not only to acquaint oneself with the nobility of the Continent, but also to expose oneself to the arts and cultural heritage of foreign places.”

“We’re going all over Europe?” she breathes, too amazed to be wholly dismayed at the possibility of months on the run — let alone how financially feasible it would be.

“Nothing less will do,” he says, voice tinged with something akin to pride. “For the FBI, or for you.”

Abigail glances further up the deck, where Will, wrapped in a dark peacoat with a plaid scarf around his neck, props himself on the railing and stares out over the sea. _“_ What about for Will?” she asks pointedly.

“Will has made his decision,” he says after a moment. “All we can do is hope that it is his own.”

“I think it is,” she says matter-of-factly. “Will had to choose between you and the FBI, and he chose you.” She purposefully omits herself from the decision-making; even if he’d known she was alive, she’s unsure if it would have swayed him one way or another.

If Hannibal notices, he doesn’t mention it. He turns his gaze up toward the prow, and his eyes darken as he thoughtfully considers Will.

 

“When were you going to tell me?”

Stirring from a light sleep, curled up on her side under the sheets of the hotel bed, a groggy Abigail spends a few bewildering moments trying to figure out where Will’s voice is coming from. No lights on in the kitchenette or over the nightstand, but there _are_ reflections of electric light cast against the wallpaper — are the glass doors leading to the balcony open or closed?

“Tell you about what?” Unquestionably Hannibal’s voice, and near where Will’s is.

“About Abigail.”

She is about to roll over and confirm whether they’re out on the balcony or not, but at the mention of her name, she stills.

“I could not keep Abigail from you for long after what happened with Margot.” A slight clink of glasses and the pouring of a liquid — wine, probably. “When we decided to engage the FBI, I thought that our departure would be an ideal time for your reunion.”

Abigail frowns at the unfamiliar name, but keeps quiet.

“So you meant her to be… what, a _replacement_ for Margot’s baby?” Will’s words are pointed and pained.

“One could say the reverse is true, but it is not. You were very attached to Abigail, Will, and you still are; Margot’s child could have never have truly filled Abigail’s place in your world.”

“But _you_ could try.” Will’s tone is sharper now. “Failing that, you could gather the shards of the teacup on your own. You could have gathered them at any point — or not dropped the teacup at all.”

“There was no other way to protect Abigail.” Hannibal’s voice remains even. “Would you have preferred that the FBI and public opinion place her behind bars?”

A scrape of glass on metal: a wine glass being placed down harder than necessary. “Of course not, but I would have also _preferred_ to not be locked up in a mental institution and accused of four murders.”

Abigail almost gasps at that, but buries her face in the pillow to conceal it.

“I know you’re putting on a — a _good face_ , for Abigail’s sake,” Will continues, his voice lower, but no less hard. “But don’t — just don’t do that to me.”

From the sound of it, Hannibal takes a sip of his wine before answering. “You underestimate Abigail. She is quite perceptive.” A slight scrape as he puts the glass down. “She has not seen me as well as you have, but she has had her glimpses.”

There is no hiding the quiet shudder that runs through her. If she has only seen _glimpses_ of who — or _what_ — Hannibal is, she cannot imagine what Will can see in him.

“Be assured, Will, that no harm will come to Abigail,” Hannibal continues. “We three must rely on each other — trust each other — in the days to come, if we are to live in freedom.” His tone is neutral, but she hears the echo in his words now of what he said to her before.

There is silence for a moment. Then: “You want to know if you can trust me,” Will says, disbelieving.

“And can I?”

Will snorts. “About as much as I can trust you, given our history.”

“Would it surprise you if I said I trusted you a great deal?” Hannibal’s voice is low, almost no more than a murmur, and thick with an emotion she cannot place. “I let you in, Will. I let you know me, see me. I gave you a rare gift… and you didn’t want it.”

“Didn’t I?” Will’s voice is quieter now.

Another, longer silence. Far below them, on the unsleeping streets of London, Abigail hears nothing but the faint rumbling of automobiles and the wintry wind that curls around the buildings and creeps through the open balcony door, pushing its frigid fingers through her hair and sending chills along her scalp.

“Tell me, Will,” Hannibal finally says, “do you intend to betray me again?”

She can almost hear Will’s eyebrows lift. “‘Betray’ is a strong word.”

“It is the word that comes closest to capturing your actions.” A scrape of the wine glass on the table, and another sip. “Conspiring with Jack and myself, pitting our sympathies against each other… it was cunning, Will, admirably so, but quite cruel.”

“I’m a good fisherman,” Will says. His tone is flat, but discomfort is starting to creep into his words. “That’s never good for the fish.”

“And so it is for the hunter and his quarry.”

A pause as the words settle, silent echoes resounding in empty air. Abigail forgets to breathe for a moment.

Will finds his voice. “If I hadn’t called you,” he says slowly, “if I hadn’t… tried to undo my _betrayal_ … what would you have done?”

“Why do you wish to know of consequences for actions never taken? For all our talk of teacups, how they shatter is often accidental, beyond our control.” Hannibal finishes his wine with a soft sigh. “But you were very much in control when you called.”

“It didn’t feel like it,” Will admits. “I hadn’t decided what to do when I called. I just... called you. I deliberated while the phone rang, but I didn’t decide until I heard your voice.” He swallows. “Then the truth came out behind the warning.”

Another pause. Then: “Forgiveness changed my mind when you changed yours,” Hannibal says simply. “But why did yours change?”

Will’s next words are no more than a whisper, but they still hit Abigail with the force of a shout. “Because I wanted to run away with you.”

“And do you still want that, Will?” Hannibal murmurs.

“What _I_ want —” Will stops abruptly. “I want things to be simpler between us, but they were never that simple.” A frustrated note. “You’ve complicated everything.”

Hannibal seems to ponder that for a moment. “Do you believe, then, Will, that you could change me the way I’ve changed you?”

The sliding of a chair as Will stands. “I already have.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Even though the final scene of "Mizumono" makes me cry inside (and outside) every time I see it, [the dialogue from that scene](http://livingdeadguy.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/H213-Mizumono-Web.pdf) is powerful stuff — it would have been a shame for me _not_ to use it.


	4. The Grand Tour

The next month is taken up wholly with travel, conducted at any and every pace ranging from leisurely jaunts to breakneck runs across border checkpoints —  not literally, of course; they are much more careful than that. They do not stay in any one place for long, and never for the same length of time: two or three days, a week or a week and a half. They buy new clothes and leave their old clothes in donation bins; they change their hairstyles and experiment with makeup to change their faces. They move from hotel rooms to rented flats to hostels, paying for all of them in cash or credit cards matching their new identities. In addition to his extensive funds, Hannibal has a seemingly limitless supply of falsified documents and passports, and with every plane seat or train ticket or car rental, they put on and switch out names and birthdates and Social Security numbers as easily as the garments from their growing wardrobes.

Abigail thinks of her multiple identities as roles that an actress in a theatre troupe might play at the same time; the imagined details of their lives constantly swim through her mind, blurring and blending into a sort of litany. She is at once Diana Woodward in London and Amy Anderson in Amsterdam, Renée Winn in Berlin and Shiloh Olsen in Copenhagen, Lucy Sorenson in Stockholm and Darienne Lattimer in Prague and Patricia Cohen in Vienna — all undergrads or graduate students from all over the United States, all traveling with uncles or parents or visiting distant relatives while on winter break. Those girls and their stories become real to her, as real as her as her own, and she can almost imagine them as separate parts of her, but she doesn’t quite know why.

It isn’t until she’s Eloise Nichols (classics major from Connecticut, flying to Spain with her older brother and his partner for a wine tour over winter break) that she realizes why the stranger’s face on her new passport is so familiar. Waiting in the terminal, she pulls up TattleCrime.com on the web browser of her new phone and, her hands shaking, she searches for articles tagged with “MINNESOTA SHRIKE”.

 _Now_ she sees their faces before her with vivid clarity on her phone screen, with the long, dark hair and the wind-chafed skin and her mother’s blue-green eyes. Dinah had become Diana and Amelia had become Amy, Rachel had become Renée and Shawna had become Shiloh, Lacey had become Lucy and Deirdre had become Darienne, Priscilla had become Patricia and Elise had become Eloise, but in the end, their names didn’t matter to her — and they hadn’t mattered to Garret Jacob Hobbs.

Suddenly sick to her stomach, she drops her phone on her suitcase and runs for the nearest restroom. As she doubles over and dry-heaves into a toilet, the faces of those dead girls well behind her eyelids like the hot tears leaking over her cheeks: staring at her resentfully, whispering bitterly _how dare you take our names, how dare you use our skins —_

_How dare you live when we are dead._

 

She is more used to the hole in the side of her head than she was back in Baltimore, even though there was really no one to notice then, but there are times when her own scrutiny and sense of self-consciousness threatens to overwhelm her. On those days, Abigail has to re-convince herself that having only one ear is nothing after having her throat slit by her own father, after bleeding out on her own kitchen floor — twice. _And one ear is a small price to pay for another chance at life._

Fortunately, the wound is easy enough to hide. Hairstyles swept to the side are fashionable now, and though she masters all manners of braids and twists and low buns for evenings out, she prefers the simplicity of a ponytail, or even just letting her hair fall loose over her shoulders. She never wore earrings before, and she doesn’t start now; even if she hung just one in the remaining ear, it would feel a little too unbalanced, a little too much of a reminder.

She doesn’t consider prostheses — not seriously, at least. As uncomfortably exposed as she feels with only one ear, having two would make her Abigail Hobbs again: a girl with a promising future that had been irreparably stained, a person just as foreign to her as a cold, rubbery prosthetic ear where warm flesh should be.

She doesn’t know who she will be yet, but she _does_ know she can never be Abigail Hobbs again.

 

Even with all of her care and her precautions, nobody pays much attention to her, the ubiquitous American college girl — not when she has Will and Hannibal at her side. No matter where they are (or what he’s dressed in, whether it’s a tracksuit or a three-piece suit), Hannibal radiates an elegant sort of charm, so she’s not exactly surprised when flight attendants or restaurant wait staff or tour guides figuratively fall at his feet; what truly takes her aback is that they display the same keen interest in and eagerness to please _Will_. She can’t quite figure out if it’s his looks or the fact that he’s with Hannibal that draws them in, but his halting language skills and his general irritability ward them off soon enough.

She can’t deny that Will _is_ looking better: more healthy, less harrowed, undeniably better-dressed and better-groomed. The tension in his limbs is still there, and she can’t tell whether it’s her presence or Hannibal’s ( _or both_ ) that causes it, but it’s lessening all the same. However, the dark, haunted look in his eyes remains mostly unchanged; she supposes that other women could think it brooding or romantic if they didn’t know that he thought about killing people for a living once — to say nothing of Hannibal’s pursuits beyond psychiatry.

 _If they knew them like I do now and if they had the choices that I had then,_ she thinks, _they wouldn’t get so close._

 

They all monitor the FBI’s progress — or lack thereof — in their own ways. Abigail bookmarks links to the _Baltimore Sun,_ the _Washington Post_ , and the FBI’s news blog, and she checks all three regularly for any news items remotely related to them. Will also keeps an eye on the FBI’s news blog, borrowing her phone to read it, and she sees from looking at her browser history after the fact that he also checks the FBI’s Most Wanted lists. Despite their range of sources, neither of them come up with anything useful.

Hannibal’s preferred news source is a bit more off the beaten track and slightly more helpful — if a good deal more unexpected.

“It would appear that the FBI is giving up the chase,” he says one night out of nowhere. If it was anyone else, Abigail would have said it seemed a casual comment — an idle conversation starter as he sat in the second-nicest armchair in their rented flat, tablet resting on one knee — but she knows that _casual_ is not in Hannibal’s vocabulary.

Will looks up from staring into space above the hearth, leaning one elbow on the arm of his chair (the nicest armchair) as he turns his attention to Hannibal. “It’s been almost a month,” he says. “At the very least, he’s discouraged, but I don’t think Jack’s remotely close to giving up.”

“I have no doubt of that, but the FBI as a whole is not quite as tenacious.” Hannibal turns his tablet around and proffers it to Will; from where she’s lounging in the third (and best-stuffed) armchair, Abigail can see the familiar red-and-white color scheme of TattleCrime.com.

Surprised, she makes to scramble up out of her seat to get a closer look, but Will wordlessly hands the tablet off to her, his face settling into a deep scowl. Sinking back into the armchair, tablet clutched in both hands, she starts to read the article with growing disbelief.

> **_BAU CONTINUES TO BE EMBARRASSED BY ESCAPE OF CHESAPEAKE RIPPER, ACCOMPLICE_ **
> 
> _by Freddie Lounds_
> 
> _BALTIMORE, MD — Nearly a month after the escape of esteemed psychiatrist Dr. Hannibal Lecter — better known as the “Chesapeake Ripper”, the most notorious serial killer of our time — the FBI is still no closer to redeeming themselves for the bungled attempted arrest._
> 
> _According to an inside source, the FBI had been working on the edges of the law to gather evidence of Lecter’s crimes for weeks before the planned raid on Lecter’s elegant home in Chandler Square, orchestrated by Agent Jack Crawford, head of the Behavioral Analysis Unit (BAU). Unfortunately, Lecter escaped just hours before the FBI’s SWAT team arrived, leaving behind a gruesome basement lair that turned the stomachs of even the most hardened agents and freezers full of suspiciously sourced meat and organs. **(GALLERY: Hannibal’s House of Horrors — Exclusive Photos! [WARNING: NSFW])** Later tests confirmed that the meat _was, _in fact, human flesh, and DNA testing has matched about a quarter of it to suspected victims of the Chesapeake Ripper with more identifications forthcoming._
> 
> _What makes this especially messy for the FBI and the BAU is the apparent involvement of “Special Agent” Will Graham in Lecter’s escape. Graham, a former police officer and an instructor at the FBI Academy, worked with the BAU as a profiler, putting his twisted mind to work identifying — and identifying_ with _— serial killers until his brief incarceration in the Baltimore State Hospital for the Clinically Insane (BSHCI) while he was on trial for the murders of the “Copycat Killer.” After a trial halted by two more murders, followed by a controversial acquittal, Graham was released, joining Crawford’s cabal and going back into therapy with Lecter in order to lure him into the BAU’s trap._
> 
> _Dr. Frederick Chilton, newly reinstated Chief of Staff at the BSCHI and author of the upcoming and highly anticipated tell-all book_ Hannibal the Cannibal: The Savory Mind of Dr. Lecter _, says that Graham and Lecter were “very close,” due to them working alongside each other at the BAU, but after Graham’s imprisonment, they had a vicious fallout for unknown reasons. Thus, Chilton was nothing less than alarmed when Graham and Lecter seemingly kissed and made up — so to speak — without any reservations after Graham’s release._
> 
> _“I’d had my suspicions about Hannibal Lecter ever since Will Graham was charged with the Copycat Killer’s murders, despite his protestations that Dr. Lecter had committed them,” Chilton confessed in an exclusive interview with TattleCrime. “The man once served me tongue at his dinner table and made a joke about eating mine. It would have been foolish of me to_ not _be wary of him, let alone the influence he held over Will Graham.”_
> 
> _Chilton, who was later falsely charged as the Chesapeake Ripper himself to buy Crawford time to catch Lecter, went on to say that Lecter’s murders — some of which may have been committed with Graham or with Graham in mind — were “tantamount to flirtation.”_
> 
> _“Hannibal Lecter was hiding in plain sight as a consultant for the BAU, analyzing the murders that he committed and playing the FBI for fools,” Chilton said. “The only one there who could fully appreciate the gory 'beauty' of his psychotic vision — and, as a result, understand him_ intimately _— was Will Graham. It’s unfortunate, but unsurprising that their relationship developed the way it did.” **(READ MORE: Inside the Mad Minds of the “Murder Husbands”)**_
> 
> _Graham was set to be arrested as an accessory to the entrapment of Hannibal Lecter and the murder of Baltimore Museum of Natural History employee Randall Tier — whom the FBI speculates that he and Lecter may have killed and “displayed” together — but the FBI's most disturbed profiler vanished the same night as the man he was meant to catch. This has also frustrated the FBI, as Graham was the only other person besides Crawford with full knowledge of Lecter’s crimes and the plot to trap him — and thus, a star witness should Lecter ever be captured and put on trial._
> 
> _Dr. Chilton, for one, is strongly convinced that Graham is still alive — “if for no other reason than that Hannibal Lecter likes him that way,” he added. “Personally, I find it far more likely that Will Graham was part of Hannibal’s schemes all along, and that the two of them worked together to outwit and outmaneuver the FBI."_
> 
> _When asked whether Will Graham was working with Hannibal Lecter, Kade Prurnell, the chief investigator in the internal inquiry on whether Crawford and Graham went too far to catch the Chesapeake Ripper, declined to comment. Agent Crawford declined to comment as well — more vehemently than Investigator Prurnell — but a source close to Crawford says that the beleaguered BAU head is “frustrated beyond belief,” but still doggedly pursuing the fugitives._
> 
> _Let’s hope that_ if _he catches up to them, Crawford will have the guts — figuratively and literally — to mete out justice on his former coworkers and friends._

Will lets out a derisive snort, and Abigail realizes he’s stood up to read over her shoulder; curiosity apparently got the better of his revulsion. “The day I trust anything Freddie writes is the day Hell freezes over,” he states flatly.

“Miss Lounds may prefer the sensationalism of yellow journalism, yes, but she does have a remarkably effective way of sussing out information.” Hannibal leans back in his seat. “Internal power struggles at the FBI are working in our favor. If Jack hasn’t picked up our trail before, he will not be able to now.”

“Let alone the FBI,” Will finishes. “God forbid _Freddie_ tracks us down.”

Hannibal’s mouth twitches into something resembling a smile, his eyes reflecting the firelight. “God forbid.”

“I don’t know what’s the worst part of that whole article,” Will mutters, pacing the floor in front of the fireplace, “the fact that Freddie sought out _Chilton_ for an interview or the fact that Chilton gave her the time of day and then some.”

“Motivated by self-interest and a desire for publicity, most likely.” Hannibal reaches for his wineglass on the table beside him. “They’ve cheated death before, and their boldness suggests that they believe they can cheat it again.”

Will stills abruptly. Silhouetted by the dying firelight, he turns around to face the other man, and the look on his face suggests a dawning realization — though not, Abigail suspects, a pleasant one.

“You knew Freddie was alive.” He seems to be speaking more to himself than to anyone else.

Hannibal nods once, his expression unchanging.

Will swallows. “How did you find out?” he asks, his voice halting.

“Her taste in perfume is even more atrocious than your taste in aftershave.” Hannibal takes a sip of his wine, seemingly casual. “At least your aftershave doesn’t impose its stench on the clothes of others.”

Will blinks, clearly taken aback. “You — you _smelled_ her on me?” he asks, incredulous, then frowns. “When did —?” His words stop as his pacing starts anew. “The night we burnt your patient notes —” He comes to a halt again; his eyes have understanding and bewilderment in them as he raises his gaze to a still-composed Hannibal. “Our… ‘last supper,’” he says slowly. “You were warning me — and — and _begging_ me to go with you —”

A shadow passes over Hannibal’s face, and it is not only from the fading flames.

“That was the last chance you planned to give me.” Will’s voice is no more than a whisper. His face looks paler without the glow of the fire to give it life.

Hannibal does not answer, but Abigail knows from the goosebumps prickling at the back of her neck that it is the truth.

 

One of the few personal effects she takes with her from Hannibal’s house in Baltimore is a journal: slim and leather-bound, with pages as heavy and pale as cream. It had been a present from Hannibal, to “occupy the empty hours” and “exercise skills of prose and observation” (his words, delivered with a faintly fatherly smile), but she’d never had much occasion to use it — her childhood diaries were probably boxed up in an FBI evidence locker, and the spiral notebook from her Port Haven days was filled with carefully worded entries and painstakingly filled-out therapy exercises: a picture of the traumatized, but recovering patient they wanted her to be, not reflecting the murderous blood that ran through her veins and gloved her hands.

She ends up stashing the Port Haven journal at the bottom of her suitcase and starts anew with Hannibal’s journal. Part of her feels like she’s defacing a work of art with every entry scrawled in cheap ballpoint pen rather than a more elegant writing implement — like the antique fountain pen Hannibal also gifted to her, left behind in that hollow house in Baltimore — but another part of her feels defiant: like she’s still her own person, not a puppet with well-concealed strings.

Whether out of misplaced optimism or a legitimate fear that Hannibal might read what she’s been writing, Abigail finds herself focusing more on the brighter parts of her days. She writes about the constant travel, describing the weather and their fellow passengers and jotting down the demographics of all the cities and towns they pass through. She lists all the museums and attractions they visit, writing down every historical or artistic detail Hannibal points out about the paintings or the architecture, and she spins stories about their day trips and nighttime wanderings. She even composes a few food reviews when they go out to eat, ranking them on a five-star scale that, in her mind, goes from “the ‘almond soup’ I made when I was five by pouring almonds into water” to “Hannibal’s cooking when he’s not cooking people.”

She almost never writes about Will or Hannibal, or Will and Hannibal together — even if she were to, she’s sure she couldn’t find the words to describe the strange, strained, but deeply familiar bond they share — and she writes about her own thoughts and feelings even less. The one time she breaks the rule is the afternoon she starts writing, and thankfully, it’s in pencil and easily erased.

 _My life’s not as bad as it_ could _be, all things considered,_ she writes then, _but it’s a life I’d hoped I wouldn’t have to live._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got the surnames of Garret Jacob Hobbs's other victims from [his page on the _Hannibal_ Wiki](http://hannibal.wikia.com/wiki/Garret_Jacob_Hobbs), but with the exception of Elise, none of them had first names... so I dove into some baby name sites and chose my own, all with some kind of distantly relevant meaning (because one, I'm really into this kind of thing, and two, Hannibal probably would be too, that pretentious bastard.)
> 
> Dinah (in the Bible, Jacob's only daughter) >>> Diana (the Roman version of Artemis, Greek goddess of the hunt)  
> Amelia ("rival, eager work") >>> Amy ("beloved")  
> Rachel ("female sheep") >>> Renée ("reborn")  
> Shawna ("God's grace") >>> Shiloh ("His gift"; also the name of the protagonist of _Repo! The Genetic Opera_ )  
> Lacey ("lace-like") >>> Lucy ("light")  
> Deirdre ("brokenhearted, sorrowful") >>> Darienne ("maintains possessions well")  
> Priscilla ("venerable") >>> Patricia ("noble")  
> Elise ("God is my oath") >>> Eloise ("famous warrior")
> 
> ... On a lighter note, writing that TattleCrime article was a _blast._ (And I _know_ Chilton said that he would never include colons in one of his book titles, but as an English undergrad who writes a lot of papers, I can tell you that it is a proven fact that colons add some pizzazz to your title.)


	5. La Esquer

The first time Abigail sees the man, he barely registers in her mind: just another local milling about La Boqueria and shopping for food, just like her and Will. And she has enough to do already — scrabbling for and fumbling with the remnants of her high school-level Spanish, mentally converting dollars into euros and back again, keeping a firm grip on her purse to keep it from being snatched by pickpockets — in addition to grappling with her own private turmoils; her discovery of the origins of her false identities still tortures her, guilt stabbing at her like antlers piercing her lungs.

What she _can_ comfort herself with when she writes her journal entry that evening, after dinner ( _escudella barrejada,_ the first proper meal Hannibal has cooked for them since they left the States), is that they seem to be getting closer to the end of their month-long run across Europe. With the exception of the TattleCrime article, nothing further has appeared on the news about any of them, whether by their real or false identities. Hannibal now dedicates the time he formerly used for checking the news for isolating himself on the balconet of their rented flat and making phone calls, switching from French to Italian to a language she doesn’t recognize and then back to French at a dizzying rate; between calls, he pauses to type something down on his tablet, or to jot down notes in a black Moleskine.

Recalling his explanation of the historical “Grand Tour,” Abigail assumes that their modern Grand Tour is taking them into France or Italy — or both — and possibly to stay. Her suspicions are partially confirmed when she wakes early the next morning to find an elementary-level Italian textbook tucked underneath her journal, and a note written in Hannibal’s immaculate penmanship that reads: _Please begin with vocabulary and grammar for Capitolo Uno. Speech exercises will come later._

Settling down at the kitchen table with the textbook and an apple from the fruit basket, she opens her journal to a blank page and starts taking notes, and for a few hours, the worries rattling around in her mind are blissfully quiet.

Her language skills are admittedly shoddy — as evidenced by her Spanish — but if teaching herself Italian is the latest thing she has to do to keep surviving Hannibal Lecter, it’ll be the easiest thing she’s had to do in a long time.

 

The second time she sees the man, it is that afternoon and she is back at La Boqueria with Will. Now that Hannibal is easing back into cooking, after a month of treating himself and them to the cuisine of the finest restaurants in Europe ( _and after a month of not having cooking facilities he deems “adequate,”_ she mentally adds), he is insistent that the ingredients for their meals be fresh and local. He does not go shopping himself, but rather jots down a grocery list in between calls and leaves it to Will and Abigail to venture out onto La Rambla to procure them.

Will seems to much prefer this to Hannibal personally overseeing the shopping. Whether it’s out of wariness and fear of Hannibal or an attachment to her, she can’t tell, but she welcomes his company now. _Funny that the man who killed my father is the closest thing I have to an ally._

They’re stopped at a fruit stand, inspecting the freshness of the fruit on offer, when she notices the man at the end of the row, talking to ( _or perhaps arguing with_ ) a flower seller in rapid Catalan. His face is familiar, but she doesn’t realize why until he fingers the cross on the chain around his neck, and she remembers him from the previous day’s visit to La Boqueria.

Abigail keeps turning over the pomegranate in her hands, pretending to study it while she scrutinizes the man out of the corner of her eye. He looks to be in his late thirties or early forties, but his dust-brown hair is greying early. In dress, he is indistinct from the locals in lightweight jeans and a black windbreaker; in facial appearance, the only thing that sets him apart is severe acne scarring that leaves pits in his left cheek. He has a bag with him, a bulging satchel with a cross-body strap that he holds tightly, but no bags of groceries.

Part of her wants to dismiss it as coincidence, but another, more paranoid voice in her head reminds herself that there are over 1.6 million people living in Barcelona and the odds of seeing this exact man in the same place at the same time of day two days in a row are decidedly _against_ it being a coincidence.

Putting down the pomegranate, Abigail fishes her phone out of her jacket pocket and then turns to her right, away from the man. She pulls up the camera app and makes a show of lifting and angling her phone while running her fingers through her hair, as if she were checking her appearance in the reflection of the screen.

Once she has the man within the frame and once she’s confident he’s not paying attention to her, she takes a few photos.

Will turns from paying the stall owner for the fruit he chose, and his eyebrows lift upon seeing her. “Taking your own mug shot so the FBI won’t have to?” he asks wryly. “Take it from me: government photos are never flattering.”

Abigail puts on a smile, ignoring the growing knot in her stomach as she stashes her phone away. “Hopefully, I’ll never have to see for myself.”

 

She debates with herself through dinner ( _esqueixada_ that would have been delicious had her worry not drained the taste from it) whether she should share the photos with both of them or just with Hannibal. Even though what common sense she had left tells her that trusting Hannibal and only Hannibal with any secret was a _horrible_ idea ( _you’d_ think _you’d have learned your lesson by now_ ) and even though she has a strange sort of solidarity with Will, quite possibly the sanest of the three of them (though she has no desire to dwell on what that says about _her_ ), she knows who has more experience in dealing with potential threats.

But this wasn’t _just_ a threat to Hannibal. Whoever this man was, he could be a threat to them all, and if he was with the FBI or Interpol or some other law enforcement agency, then all of their running and covering up of their tracks would be for nothing.

“Paris first, then Florence,” Hannibal is saying to Will as Abigail slips out of her head and returns to the dinner table. “Our new identities await us in Paris, and then we can move into the next chapter of our lives together without looking over our shoulder.” The corners of his mouth turn upwards, and his gaze seems warmer than usual. “I am eager to show you and Abigail Florence, Will.”

To her surprise, Will almost returns his smile, and it looks very close to genuine.

Inhaling shakily, Abigail puts down her fork on her plate with a sharp _ting._

Both of their gazes turn to her, Will’s wary and Hannibal’s expectant.

“Not to interrupt, but — I have something to show you.” Her mouth is dry as she removes her phone from her pocket and sets it on the table. “I know — no phones at the table,” she says quickly, anticipating Hannibal’s displeasure, “but this is important.”

Hannibal nods, giving her leave. Will continues to watch, confused, as she unlocks her phone and pulls up the photos from earlier: now cropped and focused on the unknown man. Willing her hands not to shake, she passes her phone to Hannibal.

He examines them, brow furrowing imperceptibly. “Who is this man, Abigail?”

“I don’t know, but I think he’s following us.” Hesitation gone, her words pour out. “I took these this afternoon at La Boqueria, but he was there yesterday, too. I thought he might be a shopper, but he doesn’t have any bags with him.”

Will, craning his head to take a look at the photos, now looks up, frowning. “Why didn’t you tell me someone might be following us?” His tone does not accuse, but it is too hard for a question.

“I didn’t know for certain,” she says defensively. “And if I’d told you in the market and you’d reacted in some obvious way, he would have seen that and —” Her voice trails off. “If he thought we were onto him, he might have done something drastic.”

“You had the right instinct,” Hannibal assures her before Will can reply. “The longer he doesn’t know we’re watching him back, the longer we have an advantage.” He hands her phone back to her. “Now, the question is what we do with our advantage.”

Will rubs between his eyes, where the bridge of his glasses would have been. “The lack of major media attention in the last month...” he muses. “Jack has allied with Freddie before; it’s not... wholly implausible that she would write an article about how the investigation is going nowhere to throw off suspicion while the FBI tracks us down.”

Hannibal nods thoughtfully, but his eyes are dark and calculating. “I would be very interested in speaking to this man. Our plans may hang on what he has to say.”

Will looks over at the other man sharply. “‘Speaking’?” he repeats pointedly.

“Among other things,” Hannibal replies smoothly.

Abigail tries not to think about what he meant by “other things,” but her nightmarish imaginings and past experiences fills in the gaps regardless.

Judging by the expression on his face, Will is thinking the same thing. “You’re going to get caught,” he says flatly.

“If I am, you will be as well.” Hannibal folds his hands on the table before him, the picture of calm and ease. “But we won’t.”

Will’s pensive, wary gaze goes from Hannibal to her, and it makes Abigail wonder suddenly, strangely if the “we” included her.

Hannibal’s eyes follow Will’s to her as well. “Abigail, how would this man know to find you and Will at La Boqueria?” he asks, almost conversationally.

Abigail chews on her lip as she thinks. “Routine?” she ventures. “After observing us there once, he might have predicted we would return — and then return for himself the following day to see if he was right.”

Hannibal hums in agreement. “Do you believe, then, that he might anticipate your routine further? See where you go before and after your visits to La Boqueria?”

“It’s... likely,” she says tentatively. _Where is he going with this?_

“And if there was a break in routine?” Hannibal is leaning on the table now, his eyes gleaming. “Do you think this man would be compelled to investigate, if he felt that his quarry was close to evading him?”

Swallowing hard, Abigail meets his gaze as steadily as she can as the realization of what he’s _really_ asking her sinks in.

“Yes,” she hears herself say. “I — I think he would.”

 

The next afternoon, she leaves the flat and traces the side streets back to La Rambla and La Boqueria alone, with the hunting knife made by Garret Jacob Hobbs in her purse and her heart in her throat. Hannibal had slipped the knife to her before she walked out the door; she has no idea _how_ he managed to get it through all of the airport security they’ve gone through in the past month, but she’s not complaining now.

(“I’m sure you won’t need this,” he’d told her, maroon eyes meeting blue, “but I think you will certainly feel better if you have it.” He’d pressed the bone handle into her upturned palm and curled her fingers around it, and the gesture was so ridiculously _paternal_ she would have laughed if the situation hadn’t been so grim.)

Will had not given her any parting words or weapons before she left, but she could almost feel the weight of his disapproval on Hannibal. Once, she would have found his instinct to protect her and shelter her irritating and misguided, but the closer she gets to the open-air market, the more she wants him — or anyone, really — at her side.

In addition to the knife, Hannibal has given her an extensive grocery list and a wad of euros — as always — so she starts wending her way through the maze of stalls to find them: plum tomatoes, long-grain rice, Spanish onions, garlic cloves. She moves slowly, not only because of the sheer numbers of people, but also because she pauses frequently to check behind her, waiting for her stalker to make an appearance.

It only takes five minutes and two items being crossed off the list for her to spot the man. Thankfully, he is keeping his distance, but disconcertingly enough, she seems to be watching her much more closely than yesterday.

Abigail keeps shopping at the same pace, pretending not to see him. With every step she takes, every turn she makes down another aisle, he follows her subtly, moving just enough to remain unremarkable, and despite her casual air, her blood runs cold.

Finally, the list is folded and tucked in her jacket pocket, and all the items on it are in the paper bag she cradles with one arm. Taking a deep breath to steady herself, she turns about and makes her way out of the crowd swarming about La Boqueria, passing under the iron gate that signals the entrance to the market and heading down La Rambla. A quick backwards glance confirms that he is following.

As surreptitiously as she can, Abigail pulls her phone out of her pocket and, without looking at the screen, sends the text to Hannibal that she’d prepared before she left the flat: _Got the fish you asked for. On my way back._

Tucking her phone away again, but keeping her hand on it, she checks again to make sure the man’s still following, and then turns down a side street, off La Rambla and heading into El Raval. Evening is just beginning to fall, but the streetlamps and the lights of bars and restaurants still give the illusion of day. In this liminal space between neighborhoods, there are far fewer people out on the streets than on La Rambla, let alone in La Boqueria, but that just makes it easier for the man to stand out.

She turns at the corner by a café with a dingy wrap-around glass window and continues down another, narrower street just behind the store — more of an alley than anything else. Except for a few stuffed trash cans, there’s nothing and no one back here besides her. Even so, her pace quickens a bit, and her hand wrings her purse strap as she hurries towards the light at the end of the alley.

As she pauses at the end, Abigail doesn’t make attempts to conceal her glance over her shoulder. Her heart skips a beat when she sees the shadowy outline of a man far behind her — but not far enough.

She turns on a heel down the side street the alley opens up on and starts jogging, resisting the urge to break into a full-on run. She passes in front of a church presiding over a small plaza, strings of electric lights crisscrossing over the stones like artificial stars, and she looks behind her to see that though the man is not running — _yet_ — he _is_ gaining on her.

 _You’ve got him,_ she tells herself, trying to feel triumphant as she makes a turn down the last of the alleys, jumping over a puddle that could have been anything in this dim light. _Hook, line, and sinker._

This alley is crowded with trash cans as well, but unlike the last one, it ends abruptly in a brick wall by a door with rusted-out hinges. Abigail yanks on the handle a few times before realizing that it is locked. Panic clenching her lungs despite herself, she whirls around to double back, and then stops abruptly.

The man is standing at the opening of the alley.

Her breath flutters in her throat like a butterfly, her knees shaking just as much as she drops the bag of groceries and holds out her hands, warding him back. “ _Por favor —_ ” She clears her throat, and continues in what she hopes is a stronger voice. “ _Por favor, señor, no me hacen daño —_ ”

“Shut up, _gossa_.” His voice is surprisingly unaccented, but nasal. “I know you’re American, so don’t try to fucking fool me.”

Abigail lets her fear and dismay color her face. “If you want money, I can give you my purse,” she says desperately. “I have euros, I have dollars — whatever you want; just leave me alone.” Her voice cracks on _leave_ , and she’s not sure whether that was accidental or intentional.

“I don’t want your money.” He starts walking towards her, something slipping from his sleeve and into his palm; with a start, she realizes it’s the handle of a switchblade. “I want Lecter.”

She scrunches up her face, as if confused. “Who is —?”

“Don’t play games _,_ ” he snarls, flicking open the switchblade. “I’ve seen you with his man Graham; you know who he is and where he is.”

“I don’t, I don’t, I _swear_ I don’t —” She backs away from the door, past the trash cans, toward the brick wall. Her hands are still out, as if to push him away. “Please, I don’t _know_ —”

“I think you’re a fucking liar.” He’s still walking towards her, his form blotting out more and more of the light from the opening of the alley with every step he takes. “Tell me the truth, or —”

His threat is left unfinished when the door is thrown open from the inside, banging back against the wall. Hannibal is no more than a blur as he leaps on the unsuspecting man, seizing him by the head and slamming it into the side of the alley. He lets go of him, almost dismissive, and the man unceremoniously drops to the ground, unconscious, his switchblade falling from his limp hand.

A memory of a woman’s voice calling her name, echoing through an empty house, and dark hair unbound and spread over stained carpeting flashes behind Abigail’s eyelids when she flinches away from the sudden attack. She squeezes her eyes shut even tighter, blood roaring and rushing in her ear with every beat of her heart.

“Abigail?” A tentative hand on her arm, the warmth soaking through her thin jacket. “Are you hurt?”

Exhaling shakily, she opens her eyes. Will is standing in front of her, brow furrowed in concern.

She shakes her head, not trusting herself with words.

Hannibal turns around, and the pride in his eyes when he looks at her is undeniable. “You did perfectly, Abigail,” he says. “And thank you for taking care of the grocery list as well as our pursuer.”

Abigail manages a small, trembling smile at that, pulling away from Will and bending down to pick up the bag she dropped.

Will gets to the bag first, lifting it up in his arms and then addressing Hannibal. “How much time do you have until he wakes up?” he asks, inclining his head towards the unconscious man on the ground.

“Enough time to get him up to the flat and restrain him.” Hannibal crouches and picks the man back up, slinging him over one shoulder as he straightens. “Please: go up the stairs first. I’ll need you to hold the door and get the chair and the tape.”

Will nods once, and then turns and vanishes through the open door. After a moment, Hannibal follows him through, ducking slightly to fit the unconscious man through the doorframe.

The man’s switchblade is still lying in the alley, metal gleaming in the distant light of the streetlamp. Abigail cautiously picks it up, turning it over in her hands, and then folds the blade back into the handle. Before she goes inside, she drops the switchblade into her purse, alongside Garret Jacob Hobbs’s hunting knife: another unwitting trophy of her own.

 _And probably not the last one,_ she thinks darkly as she locks the door after her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Translations:**  
>  ‣ _Por favor, señor, no me hacen daño._ = (Spanish) Please, sir, don't hurt me.  
>  ‣ _gossa_ = (Catalan) bitch
> 
> Like Abigail, the Spanish that I learned in middle and high school is all but a distant memory, but I'm 90% sure that I got that one line of Spanish correct. (I used an online Catalan-English dictionary for the insult though, because I do not know a word of Catalan.)
> 
> Barcelona is an incredibly beautiful city, and if you get the chance, you should definitely go there. [La Boqueria](http://www.boqueria.info/index.php?lang=en), [La Rambla](http://www.barcelona.de/en/barcelona-rambla.html), and [El Raval](http://www.barcelona-tourist-guide.com/en/areas/el-raval-barrio.html) are all real locations, and pretty cool places to walk in (if you know where you're going - speaking as someone who once got lost in the side streets of El Raval for two hours, it's always a good idea to have a map, but walk like you know where you're going, if that makes any sense).


	6. Morals With a Mastiff

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick warning for this chapter: there are knives. And blood. Because that's the name of the _Hannibal_ game.

An hour later, it is evening outside the windows of the flat, and the man hasn’t so much as stirred.

Abigail doesn’t notice, having spent the time rooting through the man’s belongings; she’d taken his wallet and satchel from him before Hannibal had duct-taped his wrists and ankles to one of the chairs from the dining table. Sitting cross-legged on the ottoman with plastic gloves on her hands, she sifts through the pockets of his bag and spreads out the items in front of her for inspection: some food wrappers, a crumpled carton of cigarettes, two pens (both out of ink), a “pocket-sized” Bible that weighs about five pounds. At the bottom of the main compartment, she finds a camera — a surprisingly nice one, in a leather traveling case — and a battered flip phone, and she sets them aside to examine later.

His wallet is not especially helpful either. Though he has no driver’s license or credit cards to give them his name, he _does_ have an unusual amount of cash on him; Abigail counts out twenty euro bills — all five hundreds — with assorted coins. There are also a few tattered receipts for coffee, and she recognizes the name of the café as one not far from La Boqueria.

Setting aside the wallet, she picks up the cell phone and flips it open. It is another dead end: no texts, no contacts, no pictures, and only one phone call. The number is an American one, judging by the country code, but she can’t place the area code.

Finally, Abigail turns to the camera. Taking it out, she notices two folded papers at the bottom of the case, but focuses on the camera for the moment. She turns it on and goes to the picture library, clicking through the photos from the beginning; they’re mostly of buildings around Barcelona at all hours of the day and night, and she is astounded at how professional-looking they are.

The last architectural photo is of the Gran Teatre del Liceu at night, the facade gleaming in the light of the streetlamps — _like marble, or the moon,_ she finds herself thinking. With a start, she realizes that she’s made that observation before — on her first night in Barcelona, when Hannibal took her and Will out to dinner at Cinc Sentits and then to an evening performance at the Liceu.

Mouth dry, she zooms in on the photo, scanning the crowd spilling out of the entrance to the opera house, but individual faces and forms are no more than clusters of pixels. But when she zooms out and goes to the next photo on the memory card, she finds what she suspected she’d find.

Abigail examines the photo, fingers brushing over the screen as she focuses on individual parts. Hannibal is the nearest to the lens, regal and composed even while shrugging a long coat over his tuxedo. Will is on his far side, nearly overshadowed by him, but his unruly curls peek out from behind Hannibal’s profile, almost making it look as though he had a badly dyed beard.

And _she_ — she is just in front of them, her wrap loosely hanging off her shoulders and shockingly pale against her red velvet evening dress. Her head is turned back to look at them, and Abigail looks at her past self’s wide eyes and open mouth and can’t decide if her expression is euphoric or fearful or just dismayed. _Maybe all of the above._

“Finding anything?”

Jerked out of her thoughts, she cranes her head up. Will is standing by the ottoman, one hand half-tucked into his pants pocket and his head cocked to one side.

“I was looking through what he has on his camera.” She turns the camera around to show him the photo. “I found this.”

His brows draw together as he frowns down at the screen. “Are there any more of us?” he asks quietly.

Abigail draws the camera back into her lap and clicks through the remaining photos. There are a few more from the night at the Liceu, including a close-up profile shot of Hannibal, but the bulk of them are taken in daylight in the riotous color and motion of La Boqueria. There are some of Will, and some of him with her, but there are many more photographs of her. The last one on the memory card is of her as she left the market today; her back is to the camera, but she recognizes her blue wool coat and her leather purse even from behind.

“Yes,” she finally says.

Will sighs heavily, bringing his hand out of his pocket to push his hair back from his face. For the first time, she notices that his other hand holds two folded papers — _the ones from the bottom of the camera case,_ she realizes, glancing over at the case to confirm that they were gone.

“What are those?” she asks, setting the camera down on her crossed legs.

“‘Wanted’ posters.” He unfolds and hands them to her. “For Hannibal and me.”

Abigail examines them closely. There they both are: Hannibal on one, Will on the other, their descriptions and the details of their crimes (alleged and confirmed) underneath slightly blurry photographs; she reflects for a moment that Will was right about the poor quality of government mug shots, but she doesn’t laugh.

“Do you think these were released by the FBI?” she asks, giving them back.

Will shakes his head. “Doesn’t follow the usual template. Could have been released by city police, but I don’t know why they would have this information.”

“The posters are in Spanish,” she says, giving voice to the peculiarity she’d been mulling. “This is Barcelona. Wouldn’t official notices like this be in Catalan as well?”

Will thinks about that for a moment, scrutinizing the posters. Then: “Unless these _aren’t_ official.”

Abigail stares at him, waiting for an explanation, but any she might have gotten is interrupted by a muffled groan.

Both of them turn their heads to the chair in the center of the living room. The man is coming to, limbs straining against his duct tape restraints and mouth trying to form words around the dishrag gag. They watch as his eyes go wide, as if remembering what had happened, and his head swivels wildly, trying to get a look at his surroundings.

As if on cue, Hannibal emerges from the kitchen, immaculately white apron tied around his waist. He looks from the man in the chair to her and Will, and his eyes are alight with something not unlike amusement. “I see our guest is awake,” he says lightly, as if he were announcing what was for dinner instead of an impending interrogation. “Shall we?”

Jaw set, Will sets the “Wanted” posters down on the ottoman and joins Hannibal in the center of the room. Abigail uncrosses her legs and sets the camera back in its case, but stays where she is, observing from her seat.

“Now,” Hannibal continues in that same tone, turning to the man, “while this flat _is_ relatively secluded, out of respect for our neighbors above and below us, I must ask you to keep your voice down when I remove your gag. It would be very rude for you to do otherwise.”

Though the man’s face had drained of all color upon seeing Hannibal Lecter in the flesh, he nods fervently.

“Thank you.” Hannibal reaches out and removes the dishrag from his mouth.

The man sucks in huge gulps of air, chest heaving with the effort. As his breathing stabilizes, his eyes flit from Hannibal to Will to her and back to Hannibal, as if he is unsure of who to be more frightened of.

“What is your name?” Hannibal asks.

“Marc. Marc Maria Ripollés.” The man is visibly trembling now. “Please, _Doctor_ Lecter, don’t hurt me. I’ve made a terrible mistake —”

“ _Senyor_ Ripollés.” Hannibal’s voice is almost soothing. “If you tell us what we need to know, I may not have to add you to tonight’s _paella._ I’ll ask you the questions and then we’ll see.”

Marc falls silent, his pale face blotchy underneath the acne scars. Abigail cannot help but feel that had he not stalked her and threatened her with a switchblade, she could nearly feel sorry for him. _In any case, he’s certainly less intimidating now._

Unexpectedly, Will spoke first. “You’re a photographer.”

“Yes.” Marc’s voice is shaky. “I take pictures of the city. I make prints, postcards, magnets, little things to sell to the tourists.”

“And what were you doing with your photos of _us_?” Will crouches before the chair to meet Marc’s eyes. “Did you sell those as well?”

Hannibal glances over at Will, gaze keen and intrigued.

“No — _no!_ ” Marc protests when Will’s eyebrows rise. “Not to tourists, no. _Please_ ,” he begs, “I shouldn’t have done it, I know, but I’d seen the — the posters on the Internet and — and — then at the Liceu —”

“You started tracking us,” Will finishes, almost disgustedly. He straightens up, almost looming over the bound man. “Did you know to find us at the market, or was that just a lucky guess?”

Marc swallows. “I followed you back from the Liceu,” he admits. “Not all the way back!” he says quickly. “I don’t know where _this_ is, but it must not be far from a coffee shop off La Rambla I go to a lot. Got a nice big window, good view of the street, so I just… sat there and waited to see if you would come by.” With every word he speaks, he seems to be shrinking further and further back in his chair.

Abigail remembers the coffee receipts in his wallet, and then the café she passed while leading Marc through El Raval: one with a wraparound window. _If_ I _wanted to watch people going off La Rambla, that would be a good place to do it._

“The photographs were evidence, then,” Will says flatly. “That you’d seen us.”

A pause. “Yes,” Marc says, a little reluctantly.

Letting out a harsh sigh, Will crosses his arms. “How long before you planned to go to the police?”

Marc frowns. “The — the police?” he repeats, voice climbing in pitch.

“That _was_ who issued those posters you saw — right?” Will prompts. “And if not, who did, and where on the Internet did you see them?”

“Was it Mason Verger?”

Upon hearing his question, Abigail’s gaze snaps to Hannibal: standing just behind Will’s shoulder with his hands before him and a look of detached curiosity on his face. She doesn’t think that Marc could blanch any further than he had upon seeing Hannibal, but somehow, he does.

Will slowly turns to Hannibal. “ _Mason_?” he repeats, disbelieving. “ _Was_ it Mason?” he demands of Marc.

Marc, quaking more than ever, opens and closes his mouth ineffectually, but not a word comes out.

“Mason’s been buying ad space on all sorts of disreputable websites these last two weeks, advertising for our capture.” Judging from the gleam in his eyes, Hannibal seems to be enjoying Marc’s discomfort immensely. “He’s set up an international number for any information on our whereabouts; I found the number on a TattleCrime banner ad and called it while we were in the airport — for curiosity’s sake.”

Will stares at Hannibal, clearly aghast. “You know,” he finally says, every word coming with the force of a bullet, “Mason issuing a bounty on our heads is the sort of thing that would be good to know when we’re on the run.”

“Until our enterprising photographer here was brought to my attention, I was confident Mason was nowhere near to finding us — otherwise, he would not be resorting to Internet ads and a tip hotline to do his work for him.” Hannibal turns to address Marc. “Have you made contact?”

Marc shakes his head emphatically. “No, not yet; I — I wanted to be sure. _Very_ sure of — of who I was identifying.” His eyes dart nervously over to Abigail.

It does not go unnoticed by Hannibal. “Did Mason issue a bounty for her?” he asks, his measured tone at odds with the coldness of his gaze.

“How _could_ there be?” Marc is growing more and more agitated by the second. “ _Senyoreta_ Hobbs,” he pleads, craning his head to try and look at her, “ _please —_ I am _so_ sorry for — for threatening you; I just —”

Hannibal tilts his head. “How do you know her name?”

Marc swivels his head back around, gaping at Hannibal. “I — uh —”

Abigail suddenly finds that she cannot stay silent any more.

“You must have _some_ idea of who I am,” she says, standing up. “Otherwise, you wouldn’t have taken so many pictures of me.” She grabs the camera bag by the strap and dangles it for emphasis.

“I — I had to confirm!” Marc protests, his voice going high with fright. “I didn’t know who you were —”

“I don’t think,” Abigail says slowly, the last piece of the puzzle clicking into place in her head, “that you had to confirm who I was just because you were curious.” She looks directly at him. “I think you had to confirm who I was because someone else — this Mason person — wanted to know.”

Even in the cool air of the living room, beads of sweat are starting to trickle down Marc’s forehead.

“Hannibal.” Returning the camera bag to its place on the ottoman, Abigail picks up the cell phone and brings it to Hannibal. “Is this the hotline number? The number that you called?”

Hannibal takes the phone from her and examines the screen for a moment. “Indeed it is,” he says, handing it back as his gaze rises to the bound man. “Would you care to explain, _Senyor_ Ripollés?” His voice is soft, but his eyes are dark.

For the second time that night, Marc doesn’t say a word.

Hannibal turns to her, calm facade still in place. “Abigail, will you fetch me your purse?”

Nodding despite her confusion, Abigail backtracks to the ottoman, putting down the cell phone and picking up her purse. Hurrying back, she hands it over.

“Thank you.” He opens it and removes an object, and then hands it back to her. Hannibal flicks the blade open with a practiced ease, and with a start, she realizes that he has taken Marc’s switchblade.

Marc, realizing this too, begins to shake even worse, his eyes going wide with fear. “Please, _Doctor_ Lecter,” he babbles, panicked, “I _know_ I lied to you, but _please_ , give me —”

His words are abruptly muffled when Hannibal stuffs the dishrag back in his mouth, and then they transform into a muted scream as the switchblade stabs into the back of his right hand.

Her purse falls by her feet, spilling its contents over the carpet, as Abigail claps her hands over her mouth to stifle her gasp. A muscle tightens in Will’s jaw, and he averts his eyes.

“When I remove this gag again,” Hannibal says, still perfectly composed, “I would like you to tell me what you and Mason discussed. If you say nothing, I will disassemble your thenar and hypothenar muscles, and if you lie again, your lumbricals will also be forfeit.” He leans down and looks squarely at Marc. “Do we understand each other, _Senyor_ Ripollés?”

Tears of pain leaking out of his eyes, Marc nods frantically.

Apparently satisfied, Hannibal yanks the gag out and lets go of the knife; it sticks out of the bound man’s hand like a grotesque monument.

“I called the hotline the morning after I saw you at the Liceu.” Marc is speaking almost too fast for Abigail to keep up. “The man who answered the phone told me I would be redirected to some lawyer in Geneva when I said I had information, but then I was speaking to _Senyor_ Verger. I told him what I knew, said I had pictures, and he told me to take more photos.” He inhaled, his breath wheezing, and then ploughs on. “He told me he’d pay me up front on the basis of my photos, but that I’d get even more if I got unlifted fingerprints from any of you.”

“How much was Mason willing to pay?” Hannibal almost seems intrigued.

Marc swallows. “Three million in US dollars for your capture, alive, and a one hundred thousand-dollar advance if I could get a fingerprint. He transferred one million into my bank account for my photos at the Liceu.” He glances at Will. “It was a little less for _Senyor_ Graham, but still… very much money.”

“And for Abigail?”

Marc suddenly goes very still, his eyes flickering from Will, then to her, then up to Hannibal, mute in his terror.

Expression unchanging, Hannibal reaches for the switchblade.

“ _Senyor_ Verger had no bounty for _Senyoreta_ Hobbs!” Marc bursts out, his voice squeaking with fear. “But… he was very interested. That she was alive was… very interesting to him.” His chin is trembling, the blotchiness of his face increasing. “He said that — that it would be very hard to capture you or _Senyor_ Graham straight-up, that it would be too dangerous, but — but she —”

His hand remains in the air, but Hannibal’s fingers twitch ever so slightly.

“She could be bait.” Marc’s voice is no more than a hoarse whisper. “He didn’t say this plainly, but I — I think that once he got his thugs here, he implied they would go — go after her.” His head drops, gaze falling from Hannibal. “ _Senyor_ Verger would use her to — to lure you and _Senyor_ Graham out of hiding.”

A chill that has nothing to do with the room temperature runs down the back of Abigail’s neck, and she fights the urge to shudder.

“And when would Mason’s men come to the city?” Hannibal’s eyes are dark, not shining with any sort of private amusement now.

Marc shrugs to the best of his ability, wincing as the knife in his hand is jostled. “I don’t know; I honestly don’t know. I asked for more time to get more photos and — and figure out… _things_.”

“Where we lived,” Hannibal supplies. “What our routines were. Whether any of us were alone at any moment of the day.”

Marc exhales shakily. “Yes.”

Hannibal smiles then, and the unexpectedness of it is terrifying. “What a coup for you, then,” he muses, “when you saw Abigail on her own in La Boqueria. Mason’s money was within your grasp, and you pursued your chance to get it.”

Marc curls his head further into his chest, not looking at Abigail.

Hannibal leans in and pats the bound man on the shoulder. “Thank you, _Senyor_ Ripollés. You have been very cooperative.” In one fluid motion, he wrenches the knife out of Marc’s hand and uses the gag to bind up the wound; Marc lets out a whimper before he clamps his mouth shut, fearing a reprimand or worse.

Abigail slowly lowers her hands from her mouth, letting out her pent-up breath in one long exhale. A glance to her right tells her that Will is once again watching the scene, but the indifference of his expression is lessened by his perturbed gaze.

“So… what now?” Marc finally asks once his bleeding hand is bandaged, his voice very small and tentative. “Can I — can I go? Or — or will you —?” His eyes dart to the switchblade in Hannibal’s hand.

Hannibal considers him for a moment. Then: “Abigail.”

Her head swivels to him, breath catching in her throat.

“May I have a word with you?” It is phrased as a question, but she gets the distinct sense that it is a command.

Will glances at her, and the look in his eyes is one of alarm.

Ignoring him, Abigail nods and moves away from her upended purse, going to Hannibal’s side. He falls into step just ahead of her, leading her into the kitchen. Now that she is closer to the stove, she more keenly notices the mingled, heated smell of all the _paella_ components: the roasting of the honey-drizzled tomatoes, the two saucepans of piquant rice, the richness of the boiling lobsters and the cooking chorizo.

“Is this all that’s on tonight’s menu?” she asks before she can stop herself.

“I’m afraid so.” He crosses to the counter and the garlic cloves perched on the cutting board there and, setting down the bloody switchblade far from the food, begins to separate the clove with a new knife. “Smokers’ lungs are never suitable for consumption; the other organs rarely so.”

Abigail finds herself strangely relieved by that.

“Your mind is exquisitely tuned to falsehoods, Abigail,” Hannibal says, almost offhandedly, as he strips the clove of its skin. “You were quite perceptive with _Senyor_ Ripollés.”

She has had enough experience with Hannibal’s unsettling way of delivering compliments to ignore the words and focus on what he’s _not_ saying. “What he was saying wasn’t matching up with what he had,” she says, crossing her arms unconsciously. “Even without looking at his bag, you knew he was leaving something out, too.”

Hannibal inclines his head, acknowledging her words. “But it is always useful to have one’s suspicions confirmed.”

Save for the steady _thunk_ of the knife as it connects with the chopping board, slicing through the peeled garlic, the kitchen is quiet for a moment

“What are you going to do with him?” she asks finally.

Hannibal looks up from his task, dark eyes shining in the kitchen lights. “He is not my prey, Abigail.” Setting the knife on the cutting board, he picks up Marc’s switchblade and presses the handle into her hand. “And I would not dream of stealing your kill.”

Her stomach ties itself in tighter and tighter knots the longer she stares at the switchblade, nausea rising hot in her throat.

“He cannot tell Mason where we are.” His voice is low, but firm. “Evading law enforcement is one matter, but evading Mason is quite another. If he catches our scent, he will not be easily thrown off.”

Her vision begins to swim and she ducks her head and squeezes her eyes shut, unwilling to look at the switchblade or him.

“Abigail.” He cups her head with his hands and turns her chin upwards very gently. “Look at me.”

Despite every part of her mind screaming _no_ , she opens her eyes.

“He would have hurt you, with this very knife.” He speaks neutrally, but his gaze is darker now. “Do you doubt he would be less of a coward were he not tied to a chair, defenseless?”

Marc’s snarl and the flick of the switchblade echo in her skull, and she swallows and shakes her head.

“He followed you, took pictures of you. He thought he knew who you were.” His hands shift from her cheeks to just under her jaw, almost a caress. “He did not know who you have become.”

“And what’s that?” she asks, her voice shaking.

The ends of his mouth curve up, pride flaring in his eyes again. “A hunter.”

( _No — a fisher,_ she mentally corrects him, throat tightening. _A hunter stalks. A fisher — a fisher_ lures.)

“I don’t think I can,” she says aloud, voice choked even as her words pour out. “Even though what — what he did or — or _could_ have done puts us at risk —”

Hannibal considers this, emotion draining from his face and leaving it a clinical mask. “Do you forgive him, then?”

She opens her mouth, and then closes it. “I don’t know,” she says, her voice small. _He’s not Garret Jacob Hobbs… but he’s not Nicholas Boyle either._

Despite his detachment, his eyes seem very far away. “Forgiveness is a hunter, too, and a good one. We do not see it prowling until it has leapt upon us.” One hand drops to the hand holding the switchblade, the other slides along her neck to the back of her head; a tremor passes through her when his thumb brushes the scar on her neck. “Has it caught you yet?”

She can’t lie now. She shakes her head again.

He curls her fingers around the handle of the switchblade — just like when he gave her Garret Jacob Hobbs’s hunting knife — and he brushes her hair back over her shoulders as his other hand leaves her head. His slight, secret smile has returned, and it is approving; her already-knotted stomach turns over when she links it to the fierce, warm satisfaction trickling through her veins.

She turns, the hand with the switchblade hanging limply at her side, and every step that she takes back to the living room is an effort, her feet as heavy as boulders. Hannibal follows her, his steps measured and deliberate.

The first thing she sees when she reaches the entryway is the blood, gleaming ruby-red and wet underneath the lamplight. It drips from the gaping gash in Marc’s neck, spreading over and soaking into his jacket like dye, and it has flecked and spattered over Will’s face and shirt like a birthmark.

The only thing that moves in the room is the trembling hand clutching Garrett Jacob Hobbs’s hunting knife in a white-knuckled grip.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... This chapter was a lot longer and a lot harder to write than I thought it would be; I wrote most of it in about a week, and then set it aside for another week while I debated about what to do for the ending. I ended up plotting out four different possible scenarios, but this was the one that I thought worked best in execution (pun not intended, but welcome). 
> 
> If you want to learn more than you will probably ever need to know about the muscles of the hand, I will refer you [here.](http://teachmeanatomy.info/upper-limb/muscles/hand/) If you would like the recipe that inspired Hannibal's extravagant _paella_ , I will also refer you [here.](http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/bobby-flay/shellfish-and-chorizo-paella-with-saffron-and-squid-ink-rice-recipe.html)
> 
> Also, I did not misspell/phonetically spell _Señor_ or _Señorita_ — those are what those Spanish titles would be in Catalan. ("Doctor" is the same, but I italicized it to make the distinction.)
> 
> Finally, the chapter title comes from [ Poem 1317 ("Abraham to kill him —") by Emily Dickinson.](https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Abraham_to_kill_him_%E2%80%94) If you read it, you'll probably guess why I chose it.


	7. Hearts Small and Ever-Thinning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Musical Inspiration:** ["Hope in the Air" by Laura Marling](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0l-rGtvH3cc) (which I highly recommend listening to while you read this chapter)

Abigail forgets how to move, how to speak, how to _breathe_ as she stands on the threshold of the living room and stares at the gory scene before her — not Marc’s lifeless body with his cut throat ( _cut much,_ much _deeper than mine_ ), but _Will_ , with his bloody hands and her father’s bloody hunting knife. His face is terrifyingly vacant, his eyes hollow and emotionless; he looks more like a statue than herself.

He finally turns his head, away from the body, and his gaze meets hers. His expression shifts, eyes scrunching shut and trembling lips parting and closing as if trying to speak silently, and suddenly, the blood on his face makes him seem less like a killer and more like a newborn.

Hannibal skirts around her, slowly approaching Will, but not with a hunter’s tread. He reaches out, fingers carefully and gently prying Will’s grip on the knife apart; Garret Jacob Hobbs’s knife falls, blade staining the carpet as it lands. Will’s eyes turn to Hannibal, and his expression hardens slightly, but not enough to erase his vulnerability — like a frightened child playing at defiance.

Hannibal’s fingers now wrap around Will’s palm, his other hand sliding up the sharp line of his unshaven jaw. Will raises his other hand to the other’s shoulder ( _to push him away?_ ), but his fingers involuntarily clench in Hannibal’s shirt as his forehead comes down on his shoulder, almost collapsing against the taller man’s torso.

Sound rushes back into the room as Will sucks in shuddering breaths and exhales in uneven, hoarse pants. The warm, unabashedly unguarded emotion in Hannibal’s eyes as he gazes down at Will takes her so completely aback, it makes her nearly drop the switchblade; it is hard to tell whether it is awe or reverence or —

_— adoration?_

Somehow, after half a year secreted away in the dark, after a month spent looking over her shoulder, after a night more nightmarish than any she’d had in a long time ( _no,_ don’t _think about the woman in the basement,_ don’t, _Abigail_ ), _this_ is what makes something in the back of her mind _snap_ with the crispness of a breaking bone.

She turns, hair flying around her face like a whiplash as she flees the living room, wrenching open the front door to their flat and bolting out; the coppery scent of fresh blood follows her down the stairwell, through the lobby, and out into a new darkness.

 

She knows she doesn’t want to wander the streets of El Raval alone and at this time of night, but she has no idea where she can go where she won’t be noticed. Somehow, her feet carry her to the little church by the plaza canopied in strings of lights. It’s not her first choice for a place of refuge, but it’s quiet and deserted, and with the way her footsteps ring out in the silence as she walks down the aisle, she’ll be able to hear anyone that comes in.

The age-stained pew creaks underneath her as she sits, elbows propped on her knees and hands tightly wound together. Without a coat, the chill of the wood against her back and thighs slides right through her skin, and the still, stagnant air in the nave is no better; even if she had a coat, she’s not sure it would stave off her shaking.

Marc’s switchblade is in the pocket of her jeans, heavy and cold against her hipbone. She doesn’t know why she still has it, and the question of why she feels compelled to keep it is not one she dares dwell on when its former owner’s body and blood well up behind her eyelids when she blinks.

Letting out a long, shuddering breath, Abigail drops her head into her hands, but she can’t cry and she certainly can’t pray. _And if God_ is _out there, why would he start paying attention to me now?_

Footsteps, heavier than hers had been, make her jerk her head back up in alarm. Her torso swivels around in the pew, hands gripping the back as she rises up in her seat to see who it is, body tensed for flight.

Will stands stock-still at the back of the nave, illuminated from behind by the flickering prayer candles that flanked the entrance.

Slowly, she sinks back down, knuckles turning white on the curving back of the pew. After a moment, he starts down the aisle; the corona of candlelight that rings his hair and throws his face into such sharp relief makes him look a bit like one of the saints in the dimmed stained glass windows. When he reaches her pew at the very front, he sits a few feet down from her without meeting her eyes, giving her space.

( _Maybe he has some remorse — or shame — left after all,_ she thinks dryly, bitterly, and it startles her how much the voice in her head sounds like Will’s.)

“You’ve been gone a while,” he finally says, and his voice is low and ragged, as if he’s been shouting. “We — we were starting to worry.”

Abigail tilts her wrist to check her watch; as best as she can estimate, it’s been an hour since she fled the flat. _Time flies when you’re on the run._

“How did you know where I’d go?”

Will shrugs slightly. “Guesswork, mostly,” he admits. “Hannibal didn’t think you’d stray too far.”

She turns around at that, grip loosening from and leaving the back of the pew as a new tension takes hold of her. “Where is he now?”

“Still at the flat. He said he’d deal with —” He swallows. “Marc. By himself.”

Abigail noticed for the first time that Will had changed his clothes, and his curls were damp, as if from a shower. The skin on his hands and wrists was still red, but from being scrubbed to rawness; however thoroughly he’d tried to clean himself, maroon still stained his fingernails and cuticles.

“Not so easy to wash off,” she remarks. She wants to sound meaner, more accusing, but her shield of hostility is too battered to protect her tonight.

He shakes his head, lips twisting in a grim smile. “Still easier than washing the hands I have in my mind.”

Something in the way he says it makes her look at him then. In the dim light of the church, with the sparse candlelight casting cool shadows and warm auras of light, the pallor of Will’s skin and the darkness of the circles under his eyes seem more pronounced than ever.

“Did it feel ugly?” she asks quietly. “When you killed Ma — killed _him_?” With all these icons of saints staring down from the windows and Christ on the cross hanging on the wall behind the altar, she feels as though one of them would hear her if she’d uttered the name of the murdered man.

His voice is no more than a whisper. “Unspeakably ugly.”

“Were you afraid at first?” she presses. “Like — like when you killed —” Her voice cracks and her words break off. _Like when you killed my dad?_

Will exhales. “I was afraid of what he would do with the information he had,” he says slowly. “And…” He swallows, then turns his head towards her, his eyes wide and dark in the low light. “I was afraid _for_ you.”

Her throat tightens unexpectedly and Abigail blinks back the wetness in her eyes. “You killed him so I wouldn’t have to.”

He looks away, down at the stone floor by his shoes.

“You didn’t have to do that for me,” she says hoarsely. “I could have done it. If it had come down to it, I could have done it.”

That makes Will’s searching gaze slide back up to her. “Are you sure that’s _you_ talking?” he asks darkly. “Or is it Hannibal?”

“You don’t know anything about me,” she snaps.

After a moment, he nods, expression turning more pained, more melancholy. “No. I don’t,” he admits, reluctant. “But I know enough about Hannibal.”

Her spark of anger fades as a new, disquieting thought worms its way into her mind. “He knows you, too,” she says haltingly. “He knows that — that you would do — _anything_ to protect those you care about.” She looks straight at him. “He never intended for me to kill hi — _Marc._ It… it was always _you_.”

Will says nothing, staring out into space with his fingers laced before him. His traitorous silence speaks volumes.

“You _knew_.” The realization is enough to spur her to her feet and stand over him. “You knew what he wanted you to do, and you — you _played into his hand?_ ”

“In some ways, it’s all I’ve been doing since my release. But… as the possibility of free will dissipates, my experience of it remains the same.” Will’s gaze seems disconnected, far-away. “He and I… have begun to _blur._ Conjoin.”

Abigail swallows, recognizing the uncomfortable truth of his words. “We’re all conjoined,” she says softly. “Codependent.” _Hannibal has that effect on people…_

“I wonder if any of us can survive separation,” Will comments quietly, ominously. He looks up at her, as if he is fully seeing her for the first time. “After all that’s happened — to me, to you, to Marc — do you still want to stay with him?”

Her answer shouldn’t have been so clear to her, so simple and unambiguously _right_ — but there it is, the single syllable poised on the tip of her tongue.

“Yes,” she says.

“Why?”

 _Now_ she pauses, trying in vain to find the right words amidst a thousand accusations. _Because everything I had and everyone I loved are all gone. Because there’s blood on me that I can’t wash clean and a demon on my back I can’t shake off, and the only one who doesn’t see me as a monster is him. Because all that’s left for me if I go back is a jail cell wallpapered with tabloid headlines and psych evals._

_Because you and he and my dad already ended my life long ago._

“Just _surviving_ isn’t good enough for me any more,” she finally says. “I — I just want to live.”

Will nods, a strange look coming over his face; she would have said he looks resigned, but his eyes are too sympathetic for that.

“What about you?” She crosses her arms, more to steel herself against the chill of the church than anything else. “Do you still want to run away with him?”

He exhales, long and slow. “Yes,” he says, and it feels more like a confession than a plain answer.

“Why?”

“I’ve never known myself as well as I do when I’m with him.” His mouth twists into a slight, sad smile. “We see each other for what we are and we…” He pauses briefly. _“_ We _acknowledge_ it in all its ugliness.”

Abigail ponders that for a moment, the look in Hannibal’s eyes as he gazed at a blood-soaked Will in his arms flashing across her mind again. “Hannibal isn’t content with that, though, is he?” she asks slowly. “He wants you to —”

“I know what he wants me to do.” His words are heavy, reluctant to admit what he knows. “I know too well I have the capacity for murder… but not _his_ kind of murder.” He lifts his eyes to hers, and they are begging for her understanding. “He delights. I — I   _tolerate_.”

“Tolerance is a fig leaf to hide your ravenous self from the world.” Hannibal’s voice echoes from the very back of the church, even tones and low volume amplified by the space. “You _are_ capable of delighting in wickedness, but you choose to berate yourself for the delight.”

Abigail, starting at Hannibal announcing himself, backs away from the pew with skittish steps, but Will stands and turns around, his expression now stony. “Guilt isn’t something you choose.”

“But it is something you can choose to cast away.” Hannibal draws closer to them, coming down the aisle with measured steps. “Ethics and morals are manufactured, and guilt is not found in nature either.” He tilts his head slightly, examining Will. “Do you feel guilt over _Senyor_ Ripollés’s death?”

Will’s mouth tightens, and his eyes flit to Abigail before they return to Hannibal. “Yes.”

“You fear that you made the wrong choice.” Hannibal rounds the end of the pew, but pauses before he draws any closer. “That what seemed like the best option at your moment of decision is no longer so.”

“The best option for _me_?” Will’s voice is biting. “Hardly.”

Hannibal’s eyes widen very slightly, and they gleam in the candlelight like fires of their own.

Abigail breaks the tense silence, her voice no higher than a whisper. “What did you do with Marc?”

Hannibal places his hand on her shoulder and it is all she can do to _not_ flinch. “Do not worry, Abigail,” he says, cool and collected again. “ _Senyor_ Ripollés has been taken care of.”

“In — in what way?” she presses.

His mouth curls in a secret, satisfied smile, as if enjoying an inside joke, before he turns to address Will. “I had planned for us to depart for Paris at the end of next week, but tonight’s events demand that we alter our travel plans. If we are to leave Barcelona, it must be now.”

“Now or never?” Will asks dryly.

Hannibal nods once. “Now or never.”

A long silence, one that seems to thunder in the emptiness of the nave. Then: “I’m not sure how much farther I can go with you.” Will’s words are halting, but deliberate.

“You’ve come so far already, Will.” Hannibal’s hand leaves her shoulder as he draws closer to the other man. “But not as far as I have for you.”

“Because you’ve _forgiven_ me for my _betrayal_.” Will’s tone is bitterer now. “And you wonder why I haven’t forgiven _you_ yet?”

Hannibal pauses in his advance, and his expression is more open and pained than Abigail has ever seen it before. “Betrayal and forgiveness are best seen as something more akin to falling in love,” he says quietly, raising his eyes to Will. “You cannot choose with respect to whom you fall in love.”

Will stares at Hannibal for a long time: eyes wide, mouth trembling, face wracked with warring emotions. To Abigail, he looks the same way he did when he was first reunited with her a month ago: lost.

Outside the church, somewhere in the streets of El Raval, a single, wailing siren pierces the night, reaching a crescendo and then swooping back down over and over.

“We should go.” Hannibal’s hand closes around hers, surprisingly warm, and the other he holds out to Will: a summons, a peace offering.

Will’s eyes go to Hannibal’s hand, but he doesn’t move.

Abigail’s heart climbs into her throat, keeping her speechless.

“Will.” Hannibal’s voice is softer now, and if she didn’t know any better, she would have said that he sounded... _pleading_. “Please.”

The avenging angels and martyred saints peer down at them from their stained glass windows with shining, blank eyes. On the cross behind them, Christ spreads his arms wide, anticipating an eternal, painful embrace of the world's sinners.

 

And, very slowly, Will reaches out and takes Hannibal's hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so incredibly sorry that this chapter took so long to write — not only did I have to put serious thought into how I wanted this chapter to play out, these past three weeks have been crazy-busy, so writing time was hard to come by. (And unfortunately, college will probably continue to get in the way of this fic's progress.)
> 
> But on the flip side... happy Valentine's Day/ _Silence of the Lambs_ 25th anniversary chapter! (And thank the holiday spirit and all the chocolate I've had because without it, this chapter would not have ended the way it did.)


	8. Levels of the Known World

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is dedicated to [Theedgeofparadise](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Theedgeofparadise) and [Rachel_Jay](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Rachel_Jay/pseuds/Rachel_Jay), who were on tenterhooks after that really tense and cliffhanger-y chapter. Hope this one puts your minds a bit more at ease!

There is no telling how far, or for how long, that they drive that night and the day after. Once they leave the blazing lights of the vintage street lamps and modern skyscrapers of Barcelona behind, there is nothing to light up the hypnotically winding road but blindingly bright headlights. Everything else — inside and outside of the car — is dark, with forms of hills and mountains only looming shadows, barely suggested.

In the driver’s seat, Hannibal is like a statue, save for the subtle bend of his wrists as he turns the wheel before him as fluidly as the road curves. Beside him, Will is equally still, his eyes fixed firmly ahead; from her view from the back seat, Abigail can tell that he is trying _not_ to look at Hannibal.

Her neck aching from craning it back to scan for flashing police lights on the horizon, she restlessly shifts her weight underneath the bag cradled on her lap. She can’t help but think about the last car ride like this: the last time they had to flee somewhere with nothing but the clothes on their backs, a collection of fake passports, and the quiet, desperate need to believe that they _could_ trust each other.

It’s strange to think how little has changed — and yet, how much.

 

Even though she thinks she’s too stressed to sleep, Abigail drifts off somewhere between Girona and El Pertús. She stirs at signs of light in the distance, and she cracks open her eyes just enough to see the dizzying array of city lights flashing by the car window, spinning and blinking almost hypnotically.

(“Is that Paris?” she hears herself asking groggily, even though the deeply-buried rational part of her brain knows that there’s no conceivable way that they could have driven _that_ far in such a short time.

“Marseille.” Incredibly, Hannibal doesn’t sound tired at all. “We’ll be driving along the coast until we reach Arenzano.”

His words take a moment for her weary brain to process. “We’re not going to Paris?” she asks, her words slurring in exhaustion. _What else has tonight —  last night —_ whenever _— changed?_

She can swear she hears a placating smile in his voice, as if he were comforting a teary child. “I’m afraid not, Abigail. Not this time.”)

The second time she almost wakes up, it’s because of the sunrise piercing through her eyelids, seemingly magnified in brightness by the glass. She gropes around until she finds her coat, and then balls it up into a makeshift pillow and buries her face in it, shutting out the light. She doesn’t dream — nothing she remembers, at least — but the sun’s wine-red light casts shadows on the walls of her mind.

 

It isn’t until she wakes up, sometime while they’re driving through verdant Mediterranean countryside ( _Italy, maybe? We can’t be in France anymore)_ that Abigail suddenly realizes that she is starving _._ Her hunger isn’t as surprising once she remembers that the last “meal” she had was a sliced pear and some Garrotxa cheese before she left for La Boqueria yesterday, but the recollection only intensifies the gnawed-out feeling scraping at her organs; if the faint gurgling sounds coming from the front passenger’s seat are any indication, Will is just as ravenous.

Hannibal makes a detour off the E70, pulling the car off to the side of a bucolic country road overlooking a red-roofed Italian town. While Will and Abigail unbuckle their seatbelts and stumble out of the car, blinking and squinting in the sunlight, Hannibal retrieves a small portable cooler from the trunk and opens it to reveal three glass containers of the seafood and sausage _paella_ he’d been crafting the previous night.

Abigail digs in immediately; even cold, the _paella_ is still delicious, and, more importantly, filling, and the pleasant weight of food in her stomach almost dismisses the circumstances under which the _paella_ was made. Even though she remembers Hannibal’s comments on the meat — _smokers’ lungs are never suitable for consumption; the other organs rarely so —_ she’s not entirely sure that, starving as she is, she would turn down a meal like this even _if_ it had human flesh in it, and it’s a singularly disquieting thought.

(Will hesitates at first — perhaps thinking a similar thought as her, but not the exact same one — but with a glance at her and a nod and a smile from Hannibal, he takes his portion and slowly starts to eat.)

 

Other than their brief stop for breakfast ( _dinner for breakfast, really_ ), the drive proceeds otherwise unobstructed. As their route carries them across northern Italy before turning to the south and veering away from the coast, the landscape turns from wide, rolling fields to sparse forests of pine and holm oaks; looking out the window, Abigail can see mountains looming in the distance, rocky slopes near-covered with greenery. Overhead, the brilliant blue morning sky fades into a more subdued color as grey clouds creep across it.

Eventually, Hannibal turns the car off the main route and away from the clusters of picturesque small towns, navigating down a series of increasingly more rural roads, going deeper into the forest. It’s hard to tell through the thicket of trees and scrub brush, but Abigail thinks she sees flashes of the Mediterranean through the crisscrossing twigs and thatched leaves.

The final road — more of a trail than a road, from how narrow and rutted it was — leads to a small, grassy clearing at the top of a hill, ringed by thin, bare-branched birches. Down below, beyond low stone walls dappled with moss, a long dock stretches out into the glistening sea.

What captures Abigail’s attention is not the water, but the small house on the edge of the clearing. The walls are mostly batten siding of wooden boards stained varying shades of brown, with foundations of stone showing underneath and an ivy-covered chimney stretching up one side. The double doors, of some dark and heavy-looking wood, are set with brass knockers, and the windows are large and paned with glass squares, set apart with black muntins; higher up, there is a small, iron-railed balcony with glass doors behind it. And yet, for all its antiquated touches, the architecture has a strangely modern feel to it.

Abigail leans forward in her seat and cranes her neck to get a better look at the house. “Is this where we’re staying?”

“It is.” Hannibal unlocks the car doors and steps out, making his way to the other side of the car; once he sees that Will has already unbuckled his seatbelt and staggered out of the car, he turns on one heel and goes to hold open Abigail’s door and politely help her out. “I bought this property some years ago, but this is the first occasion I’ve had to use it.”

She pauses, one hand gripping the car door and one hand still clasped in his. “This is yours?” she asks, surprised. _I’d expected something… more urban, more opulent. More to Hannibal’s tastes than mine or Will’s, anyway._

He glances down at her, that fond, faintly paternal smile softening his face. “ _Ours_ , now.”

Abigail gazes in wonder at the house — not a rented flat, not a cramped hotel room, but a _house. Their_ house. Despite the events that had driven them here from the other end of Europe, the thought of living in a real house again — or living _anywhere_ for longer than a week — makes her strangely giddy.

Shaking it off and coming back to the present, she briefly returns the smile and then follows Hannibal to the trunk to fetch their luggage.

 

Despite how small it had looked from the outside, the house seems much larger and more open within. The walls are smooth, white plaster, and so are the ceilings, although those are crossed and split by dark wooden beams. The floors are wooden as well: a rich, vibrant mahogany. There are stone accents everywhere: the (largely decorative-looking) fireplace in the living room, the countertops in the kitchen, the wide, shallow steps up and down the varying levels on a single floor. And the windows are just as large as they’d appeared.

Of course, Abigail can’t help but think that this apparent size is partly due to the fact that the house is largely unfurnished. The kitchen and the area that appears to have been designated as the dining “room,” due to its long table ringed with high-backed chairs, are mostly furnished, but there are no armchairs or sofas or even a carpet (let alone a single painting) in what she _thinks_ is the living room. She hasn’t ventured beyond the main floor yet — though she’s seen the stairs leading to a hidden lower level, as well as those leading to an upper level that she hadn’t thought the house had room for — but she’s willing to bet that those are just as bare.

“I apologize for the house’s state.” Hannibal sets the cooler on the island in the kitchen’s center, next to the stove top; the longer she looks at the kitchen, the more Abigail realizes that the setup is very similar to his house in Baltimore. “I’d intended for this to be a summer house, and I anticipated having more time to furnish it than we ended up having.”

Will, slinging his duffel bag off his shoulder and to the floor, raises his eyebrows at that. “A summer house?”

“I’d pictured us living in Florence for much of the year, with summers and some vacations bringing us here.” Opening up the cooler, Hannibal starts removing small cartons of food and wrapped produce and meat. “In addition to being a beautiful country, Croatia has a unique climate: both Mediterranean and continental.”

“It also has no extradition treaty with the United States,” Will points out dryly. “Perhaps this would be a better option for year-round living than Italy.”

Hannibal inclines his head. “Perhaps.” He opens one of the massive refrigerator doors and begins placing the food on the counter inside. “It’s certainly a good spot to lay low for a while, until we can return to the original plan.”

“Until Mason quits breathing down our necks?” Will crosses to the island, leaning against it and watching Hannibal stock the refrigerator.

“With what breaths he can manage without choking on them.” Hannibal places the remaining leftover _paella_ on the top shelf and then closes the refrigerator.

Hearing that mysterious name once again, Abigail speaks. “Who _is_ Mason?” she asks haltingly. “And why is he after us?”

Hannibal and Will share a long, musing look, then turn their heads to her; the syncopation of their movements almost make them seem like reflections of each other.

Will sighs, pushing his hair back from his forehead. “Mason Verger —” he starts, every syllable harshly enunciated.

“— is one of the topics we will be discussing at dinner,” Hannibal finishes smoothly. “Will: would you care to join me in shopping for some groceries? We don’t have enough food to last us the week, let alone to make a proper meal tonight.”

Will’s gaze snaps back to Hannibal. He opens his mouth, and then closes it, a resigned and irritated look coming over his face. “Sure.”

Hannibal, unaffected by Will’s shift in mood, addresses her once again. “Would you like to join us, Abigail?”

“I —” _should probably stay out of this_ “— I’ll stay here and unpack,” she says quickly. “If you don’t mind.”

“Not at all.” Hannibal picks up the cooler with one hand and guides a still-glowering Will to the doors with the other. “We’ll return in an hour or two.” He opens one of the front doors for Will, but pauses before he leaves. “And please: feel free to explore the house.”

With that, he vanishes outside, and with a _click_ of the lock, she is alone in the house with a pile of bags by her feet.

 

Abigail has to admit to herself that she is less eager about unpacking and more burningly curious about the new house. And that curiosity is how she finds herself leaving the luggage in the (presumed) living room and wandering through the combined kitchen-and-dining-room to the stairs leading down to the lower level.

The lower level has as open of a floor plan as the main floor, and though there _is_ a door leading to an empty wine cellar and pantry, it seems to be less of a storage space and more of a library or study. High bookshelves of the same wood as the flooring line the back wall, facing a wall that is almost entirely a window — or a massive set of glass-paned doors. Unopened shipping cartons, probably filled with books, ring a monolithic desk and a swivel chair upholstered in leather.

With a start, Abigail realizes that the chair is almost exactly like Hannibal’s desk chair in his Baltimore office — _no, not “almost,”_ she thinks, examining it critically. _It’s the same chair._

_But what’s it doing in Croatia?_

Crouching down by one of the cartons, she checks the shipping label on the side; this one, at least, had been shipped from Baltimore as well. A cursory check of the other boxes confirms that most of them were from Baltimore, or at the very least, somewhere in Maryland — though a few _are_ from outside the United States. _“Anticipated having more time to furnish the house” — yeah,_ right.

Abigail sits back on her heels and contemplates the boxes, chewing her lip. _Shipping your own office furniture to yourself when you’re on the run is…_ really _risky. Or just dumb._ She straightens up and turns around, leaving the cartons behind. _I just hope that Agent Crawford doesn’t think to use this to find us._

Climbing back up the stairs, she wanders over to the other side of the main floor, to the hallway branching off the living room. Opening doors and peeking through them, she finds a small bathroom, a less small (and impeccably clean) laundry room, and a large garage with stone floors; despite its dustiness and dimness, it’s still unusually nice ( _and uncluttered_ ) for a garage.

Turning back down the hallway, Abigail pauses long enough to grab the luggage — slinging Will’s duffel over her shoulder and taking hers and Hannibal’s suitcases in both hands — before ascending the stairs to the final, highest floor. The landing is oval-shaped, with doors on either side and a small, round window high on the wall between them. Placing Hannibal’s suitcase on the floor and sliding Will’s duffel off her shoulder to rest beside it, Abigail tightens her grip on her suitcase and takes the door to the left.

The room she finds herself in is largely bare, with only a mattress atop a wooden bed frame in one corner. There are more doors to choose from in here as well: a set of wide double doors on her left, a single door on the right, and straight ahead, the glass doors that lead to the iron-railed balcony she saw as they drove in. From her view through the doors, as well as the other windows, she can see the sparse forest surrounding the house, and the thin, winding road leading into its depths.

Tossing her bag on the mattress ( _it’s a twin bed; this room’s_ probably _mine_ ), she opens up the double doors, and they fold on themselves to reveal a closet that, while not a room in itself, is certainly spacious. Opening the other door, she finds a private bathroom with burnished fixtures and a surprisingly large shower walled in by polished stone. Fingering a decidedly oily strand of her hair, Abigail is suddenly very aware of the fact that she can’t remember the last time she took a long, hot shower.

 _Later… maybe._ Heading out of her new room, and scooping up Hannibal’s and Will’s bags off the floor, she opens up the door on the right. _But if Hannibal can ship his furniture from Baltimore, he_ definitely _has a bar of soap around here_ somewhere.

The room across the hallway is almost a mirror image of hers: almost completely unfurnished and with a door to a closet, another to a bathroom, and a third and fourth to a balcony. However, both the bathroom and closet are larger — the former has more counter space and a linen closet, while the latter gives new definition to the term “walk-in-closet” — and the balcony, nearly the length of the room, looks out not on the woods, but on the Mediterranean.

And the mattress on the bed frame with the richly carved headboard in the very center of the room, between the two doors leading to the balcony, is a king-sized mattress.

Abigail suddenly stops in place, staring open-mouthed at the bed: the bed large enough for two people, in the only other bedroom on the floor. She makes the mental calculations; _obviously_ , the other bedroom was hers, leaving only —

She gasps and claps her hands over her mouth, her face flushing despite herself. Distantly, she remembers Hannibal’s comment that he’d pictured them living in Italy for much of the year — _at first —_ before retreating here for the summer — _months and months away..._

 _So while he’s holding off on our original plan… he’s fast-tracking his plan to… what,_ seduce Will?

Despite her consternation, a treacherous giggle escapes through her fingers at the absurdity of it all. Dropping the bags to the floor, Abigail doubles over in helpless, hysterical howls of laughter that echo through the empty house, and it feels like the first time she’s truly _laughed_ in a sadly long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're having trouble imagining what the Murder Family's new home looks like, I _loosely_ referenced it off [this (high-end) cottage designed by Jendretzki LLC](http://archinect.com/firms/project/2495253/connecticut-house-in-the-woods/62404973). The interior details _sorta_ resemble [this country house](http://www.idesignarch.com/rustic-country-house-in-croatia-with-contemporary-elements/), which is actually in Croatia.
> 
> ... In other news, I _finally_ finished that Abigail fanmix I was working on (more show-centered than for this fic), so [check it out over on 8tracks](http://8tracks.com/turwaithi3l/iphigenia-and-artemis)! (A Hannigram fanmix _is_ coming... eventually. Right now, all that's giving me trouble is the cover art.)
> 
> (Before I end these end notes, I also recommend reading the poem ["Persephone the Wanderer" by Louise Glück](https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/persephone-wanderer). Not only did it provide this chapter with its title, but it also reminds me a great deal of Abigail.)


	9. The Forces Contending

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... I'm not dead, guys; I _swear_. (I mean, I might _feel_ dead, but that's beside the point.) Between multiple papers, a frantic summer job/internship hunt, and some unexpected family issues, March and April were messy months and May was even worse. Unfortunately, now that I'm working two part-time retail jobs (basically one full-time job) and have an internship on top of that, I have even less time to write than I did before. I'm still going to forge ahead with this fic, but be aware that updates are going to be coming slowly.
> 
> In any case, enjoy this chapter! (It's been a long time coming.)

“How do you find the house?”

At the first words spoken since sitting down for a late, light dinner — _breakfast for dinner, really_ , Abigail thinks bemusedly — her head jerks up. She almost answers, but then remembers to finish chewing her mouthful of High Life eggs and swallowing them before meeting Hannibal’s polite, but piercing gaze.

“I like it,” she says, balancing her silverware onto the edge of the plate. “It feels — _right_ for us.” She’s not willing to commit to _perfect_ just yet, even though the house is just big enough for the three of them: not one more, and not one less.

Hannibal’s smile is slight, but self-satisfied. Across from her, Will glances up; he hasn’t said a word since he and Hannibal returned from grocery shopping, but his raised eyebrows speak volumes.

“How much of the land is ours?” Abigail reaches for her orange juice: served, paradoxically, in a crystal goblet that Hannibal had unpacked from one of the many unmarked cartons that he and Will had returned with.

“Every acre from the end of the dock to the beginning of the road.” This is no boast, but a statement of fact.

“Why have the dock?” she asks, remembering her initial curiosity. “Is there a boat somewhere?” Looking down from the balcony of the larger bedroom, Abigail hadn’t seen anything moored out on the water, let alone tied to the dock, but she couldn’t help but imagine herself at the prow of a sailboat, leaning out over the Mediterranean with the wind running its fingers through her hair.

“I’m afraid not, but a boat may be a worthwhile investment.” Hannibal looks at Will, waiting expectantly for his input.

Will’s expression of mild exasperation softens, but not by much. “Might be nice,” he mutters in reluctant agreement, sawing into his breakfast sausage with a tad more force than was probably necessary. “If escape by car isn’t an option the next time Mason gets a whiff of us, might as well escape by sea.”

“ _If_ there is a ‘next time’,” Hannibal cuts in smoothly.

Will snorts. “If you keep calling international tip lines dedicated to collecting information about us _just to see what would happen_ , there _will_ be a next time.”

Eying the new and very sharp dinner knives at each of their place settings — and the way that Will was gripping his — Abigail quickly decides to try and steer the conversation in another direction before it becomes a full-blown argument. “About Mason...” she begins.

Both Hannibal and Will turn their attention to her, their facial expressions unchanged: the former’s still carefully neutral, and the latter’s still decidedly stormy.

Abigail takes a sip from her goblet, the juice tangy on her tongue. “How do you know him?” she asked. “And why is the heir to the Verger meatpacking fortune after us?”

Hannibal cocks his head to one side, eyebrows lifted slightly. “You’ve done your research,” he observes.

Abigail shrugs. She wouldn’t have called trawling through _Forbes_ interviews, _Wall Street Journal_ stock market predictions, and _Baltimore Sun_ articles on Hannibal’s iPad “research,” exactly, but it had been enough to provide some context. The son and heir of meatpacking magnate Molson Verger, Mason had all but vanished from the public eye after an unexplained slaughterhouse accident that had left him paralyzed and (according to the _National Enquirer_ ) horribly mutilated — although strangely enough, despite the many philanthropic and charitable pursuits of Verger Enterprises and the high-profile nature of the wealthy Verger family, there wasn’t much mention of Mason himself in the news to begin with.

The most recent photograph she could find of Mason Verger was a grainy tabloid photo snapped at Molson’s funeral five years ago, reprinted in almost every online news source she’d come across. In it, Mason, clad in a black suit and a white overcoat with a fur collar, knelt by his father’s towering marble headstone, his face contorted in sorrow as his gloved hands clutched at his unruly blonde hair. Abigail had examined that photo until she’d heard Hannibal and Will walk into the front hall with bags upon bags of groceries and boxes of dinnerware, but could find no clue in it as to what his connection to them was.

“His sister, Margot, was a patient of mine,” Hannibal continues, cutting himself a piece of the roll holding his fried eggs. “Later, I also had sessions with Mason, though those were... less formal than hers.”

 _Margot._ The name sounds strangely familiar to her, but what Abigail remembers is the photo of a grieving Mason and the striking, stonily composed brunette woman standing just behind him, her eyes slanted towards the camera in a disdainful, but hollow stare. Oddly enough, none of the various captions had identified her.

“Why was Margot in therapy?” Something tells her that Hannibal probably isn’t overly concerned with doctor-patient confidentiality at this point in his career — or rather, what remains of it.

“Mason.” Will stabs his fork into the sausage with an unholy scraping sound as the tines hit china.

Abigail’s mouth suddenly goes dry. “Oh.”

“Mason is supremely discourteous.” Hannibal’s tone is matter-of-fact, but his eyes are cold. “He has little regard for the personal rights and boundaries of others. Not much better than the pigs he breeds.”

“Worse,” Will mutters.

Despite her deepening contempt of this man unknown to her, she feels a sense of creeping dread. “So what did you do to him?” she asks, trying to keep the tremor out of her voice.

Hannibal and Will glance at each other before turning their eyes back to her. Once again, Abigail wonders at how they seem to move in uncannily perfect time with each other, even to the smallest of movements.

Hannibal speaks first: measured, factual. “He ingested a potent combination of psychedelic compounds that made him very susceptible to suggestion.”

“And then you _suggested_ that he cut off his face and feed it to my dogs,” Will says flatly, his fingers testily drumming on the table.

Abigail blinks. “Oh,” she says again, her voice even smaller.

“If we are to be fair, Will,” Hannibal reminds him lightly, “Mason’s initial target _was_ your dogs. I merely told him to turn his knife elsewhere.”

Will does not look any more pacified by this correction.

Abigail swallows. _Small wonder Mason’s after us._ “And the paralysis?” she asks tentatively.

Will jerks his head in Hannibal’s direction. The other inclines his head in acknowledgement.

Taking another sip of orange juice, Abigail tries to process all of this. “What about Margot?” she finally asks, setting her goblet down. “How is she now?”

“Never better, I imagine.” Hannibal takes another bite of eggs, chews methodically, and swallows. “Of course, as her therapist, I would still recommend that she follow through where Mason is concerned, but besides that, I couldn’t be more pleased with her progress.”

Will snorts. “Please. For all you know, Margot could be helping Mason track you down for what you helped him do to her.”

Hannibal lays his fork and knife down and looks straight at Will. “Even if that is the case,” he says slowly, deliberately, “Mason will not find us here.”

“He might,” Abigail says before she can truly process what she is saying, “if he thinks to look at shipping records.”

Very slowly, Hannibal turns his head back to her, and the expression on his face is surprisingly neutral and inexplicably terrifying. Will’s gaze goes from Hannibal to her and then back to Hannibal as it hardens into something more accusing.

Her mind finally catches up to her mouth, and her stomach suddenly feels like a bottomless pit. “I — if anyone’s done with dinner, I — I can clear the table,” Abigail stammers, quickly standing.

“Abigail.” Hannibal leans over the table, folding his hands before him as he fixes his maroon eyes on her. “What makes you say that?”

Abigail swallows, slowly sinking back down into her seat under his probing gaze. _No point lying about it now._ “I — I saw your furniture,” she finally says. “Your office furniture and — and things. Downstairs.”

Will’s eyes widen and then narrow in the space of a second as he glares at Hannibal. “You shipped. Your belongings. To _yourself_ .” He opens his mouth again, but instead of continuing, he exhales heavily. “Now I _really_ wonder why Mason hasn’t found us yet,” he said sarcastically.

“I took precautions, Will,” Hannibal says evenly. “None of my shipments from Baltimore will be traced back to us.”

“The Tiffany china, then. Or the damask cotton tablecloth. Or the truffles, or the imported Italian wine, or _anything_ we just bought at the grocery store.” Will’s tone is much more biting now. “You have very specific… _tastes_ , and Jack or Mason or anyone trying to cash in on that bounty will know that and follow the trail of receipts back to us.”

Hannibal closes his eyes briefly. “Will —”

“Bedelia warned me this would happen, you know,” Will continues, cutting the other off. “That you would get lost in self-congratulation at your own cunning and refined tastes, and that _that_ was how you would get caught.” He lets out his breath harshly. “I didn’t think you could be that _thoughtless_ , but —”

“Will,” Hannibal repeats, his tone warning.

“ _Don’t_ ,” Will snaps. “At this point, I’m surprised that you sunk that photographer to the bottom of the harbor instead of putting him on display in the middle of La Rambla.” He snorts. “ _That_ would give Freddie something to write about.”

“ _Will._ ” Hannibal suddenly stands up, making direct eye contact with him.

Will meets his gaze unflinchingly, not moving from his seat and not responding. Finally: “This isn’t sustainable, Hannibal.” Most of the rancor has gone out of his voice, but he is still firm. “I won’t always be able to warn you.”

Abigail isn’t quite sure if that’s a reminder or a threat, but Hannibal seems to take it as the former. He nods once, averting his gaze briefly.

Will, too, lets his eyes fall, fingers fidgeting by his silverware. Then, with a scraping of wood on wood, he pushes his chair back.

Hannibal’s gaze snaps back to him. “Where are you going?”

Will stands up, tossing the napkin that had been on his lap by his plate and his half-finished dinner. “Bed.”

Abigail had been reaching for her goblet, but at the word _bed_ , her hand spasms and nearly knocks the whole thing over.

Hannibal’s shoulders stiffen, but his voice comes out even and calm. “I’m afraid the upper floor is not yet furnished.”

“Bullshit,” Will says flatly. “You shipped your entire office from _Baltimore_ ; why not bedroom furniture?”

Abigail actively resists the urge to bury her face in her hands so she would not have to witness what is bound to happen next.

Hannibal exhales. “Will —”

“ _Enough_ with my name.” With that, Will turns and stalks away from the table, reaching the stairs and climbing them with heavy footfalls.

Just as he vanishes from view at the top of the stairs, Will’s footsteps stop and Abigail’s heart instantly plummets into her stomach. She sneaks a look at Hannibal, but he shows no signs of following Will.

Upstairs, a door swings open with a slight _squeak_ of disused hinges. Abigail tenses, waiting for the door to slam shut and for Will to stomp back downstairs, but there is nothing but silence.

Then the footsteps continue on and the door closes again.

Abigail blinks, a little taken aback. Hannibal’s eyes narrow almost imperceptibly, and he leaves the table without pushing in his chair after him. After a moment, Abigail stands as well and trails Hannibal up the stairs, taking the steps two at a time to keep up with his longer stride.

The door on the right side of the hallway is closed and there is no sign of Will.

Now frowning more visibly, Hannibal tries to turn the doorknob. It jiggles in place and does not open.

From within the locked master bedroom, Abigail hears the faint hiss of the shower being turned on.

Hannibal stands back from the door and looks it over, the expression on his face changing from wariness to something more resigned. Then he turns around and walks back down the hallway, shoulders hunched and hands curled by his side.

“Would you like help with cleaning up dinner?” she ventures, unsure of what kind of mood he’s in.

Hannibal pauses at the top of the stairs, but does not turn around. “Thank you, Abigail,” he says, his voice strangely quiet, “but one person will be enough.” With that, he descends, leaving her in the empty hallway.

After a moment, Abigail slowly turns to the room on the left — _my room now —_ and slips inside and closes the door behind her, that old knot in her stomach tangling itself up again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ... happy Father's Day?
> 
> As with the previous chapter, the title comes from the poem ["Persephone the Wanderer" by Louise Glück](https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/persephone-wanderer). (Fun side note: I did [a reading of this poem for National Poetry Month](http://brunetteauthorette99.tumblr.com/post/142501332223/30-days-of-poetry-day-ix-persephone-the), which you can find over on my Tumblr if you wish to listen to it.) And, as promised, [my (show-based) Hannigram fanmix](http://8tracks.com/turwaithi3l/folie-a-deux) — complete with the sixth (or seventh?) interation of the cover art — is finally on 8tracks!


	10. The Rules of Disorder

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's the end of my summer break and I feel a little more dead inside and outside than when I last updated. But it's okay, because I'm going back to college and my library job — which, compared to working retail, is a physical, mental, and emotional cakewalk. (Still not a whole lot of time for writing, but hey: I'll take what I can get.)
> 
> What's even _more_ than okay is the fact that this fic got nominated for Fresh Meat Friday during its inaugural week! To check out other new fanworks by up-and-coming Fannibal creators, you can visit the [Fresh Meat Friday collection on AO3](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/Fresh_Meat_Friday) and/or follow the [Fresh Meat Friday blog on Tumblr](http://freshmeatfriday.tumblr.com/) — you're sure to find something new and excellent.
> 
> Also: happy [Fanfiction Writers Appreciation Day](http://you-make-me-wander.tumblr.com/post/127178746783/to-celebrate-the-fanfiction-writers-appreciation) and happy first-ever [Hannigram Day](http://omnisexualhanniballecter.tumblr.com/post/149006396378/mark-your-calendars-fannibals-were-celebrating)! (Not going to lie: both events were _major_ motivators to finish this chapter in a timely manner.)

Abigail couldn’t fall asleep.

Unfortunately, it was not through lack of trying.

Her first attempt came after an awkward, unsure moment of standing in the middle of the room followed by five stilted minutes of unpacking what she could and laying it in the floor of her closet (she’d added _clothes hangers_ and _a chest of drawers_ to her mental list of Things Needed For Her Room to Be Liveable). Balling up her blue wool coat into something vaguely pillow-shaped, she’d curled up on the mattress and listened to the shower running in the bathroom in the bedroom across the hall. She had almost drifted away completely when Will finally turned the water off, and the sudden absence of sound brought her back.

She wasn’t too unhappy about it then. Still aware of her unwashed hair and just then realizing that she was still in the clothes she’d been wearing since yesterday morning, back when they’d still been in Barcelona, Abigail reasoned that a shower probably wasn’t a bad idea anyway.

It hadn’t been much of a shower. Stripping herself of her sweaty, travel-worn clothes and kicking them into a corner of her room, she’d stood under the hissing hot water for only a few minutes, combing her fingers through her tangled hair, before turning it off again. There was no shampoo or soap — more additions to the lengthening list in her head — and she couldn’t find a towel either. Ultimately, she made do with her bathrobe to dry herself off and to wring out her hair.

Pulling her hair up in a damp, messy bun and tugging on a faded, but clean T-shirt large enough to be a nightshirt, Abigail settled back down on the bare mattress and tried to sleep again. Her room was much darker, and the silence that first woke her seemed to fill the house, weighing down on her chest with an almost crushing force.

Neither awake nor asleep, she’d stared up at the ceiling, at the white plaster split by dark wooden beams. They’d looked a bit like the bars of a cell, and somehow she’d thought of Will, going from a physical prison to a room much like this one — except with a king-sized bed.

She’d wondered where Hannibal had ended up sleeping tonight. Downstairs, in one of the chairs at the dining table? In the study, on one of the carpets he’d had shipped from Baltimore? Or upstairs and not asleep at all, sitting patiently outside the door across the hall? (Abigail had almost smiled at the thought of Hannibal lingering in the hall like a needy cat waiting for its master, but the urge to smile vanished quickly.)

 _Is this how it’s always going to be?_ she’d thought, curling up on her side with her bare knees drawn up to her chest. _Walking a minefield at every meal?_

Her eyes went to her journal, lying on the floor by her emptied bag, and for a moment, she thought about turning on the light, grabbing a pen, and writing out something other than a travel diary. Something that would help her make sense of this situation — of Will and Hannibal — of herself. Something _real_.

 _Writing about your_ feelings _isn’t going to help you,_ saysa nasty, cynical little voice inside her head. _Face it, Abby: there isn’t anyone in the world who can help you now._

Flopping over onto her other side and tucking her hands beneath her jacket-pillow, Abigail squeezed her eyes shut and waited for everything to go away.

 

Unfortunately, Abigail’s problems do not end at falling asleep. They continue with _staying_ asleep.

 

She jolts upright: sweating and shaking, her gasping breaths rattling in her chest. Her room is black, and the totality of the darkness is almost as suffocating as what woke her up so suddenly and violently.

Abigail raises a trembling hand to her neck, to the ridged scar around her throat. Her fingers come away with a thinly cold dampness on the tips — not the hot, thick flood she had feared.

Struggling to get her breathing back under control, she continues her cautious investigations. Lifting both her hands up, she found her hair out of the scrunchie and in disarray: half in a tangled cloud around her head and half plastered to her clammy face. Her T-shirt is similarly damp, and twisted around her body; the collar had tightened around her neck from her thrashing as she’d slept, and she jerks it away from her scar.

She drops back down onto the mattress as one arm flops over the side of her bed as she scrabbles for her phone, somewhere on the floor. She finds it and opens it up, squinting against the sudden brightness as she checks the time. It is shortly past one in the morning.

Abigail lets her phone slip from her fingers as her eyelids close briefly. She can feel a sob rising in her throat, but she chokes it back down. Her heart keeps thumping in her chest, low and heavy like an intruder’s footsteps.

Her mouth is parched and she licks at her lips, finding them dry and cracked. The fleeting, but desperate want for water that shoots through her is enough to get her legs over the side of the bed and her feet on the floor.

Shucking off her sweat-soaked T-shirt and groping in the dark through the clothes on the floor, Abigail finds another T-shirt and a pair of sweatpants before stumbling to the bathroom and flicking the light switch on. Scrunching up her eyes against the blinding glare, she wipes off her damp limbs and back with her bathrobe and splashes some water on her face before pulling on the new clothes. The scrunchie she pulled her hair back with is missing, so she settles for scraping her tangled hair back from her face with her fingers.

Before she turns off the bathroom light and stumbles back into her bedroom, she double-checks her reflection in the mirror. The scar on her throat is pale and shiny, but still closed.

Abigail finds her way to the door by pressing her hands to the wall and blindly feeling her way along, then fumbling for the doorknob and opening it. She slips out into the hall and closes the door behind her as quietly as she can. Surprisingly, it’s less dark in the hall than it was in her room, and she wonders where the source of light is coming from; no moonlight streams through the small window at the end of the hall, and there is no glimmer of lamplight underneath the door across the hall.

Cautiously shuffling towards the top of the stairs, Abigail grips the railing with both hands and cranes her head to try and get a better look downstairs. Despite her blurred vision, she _swears_ she can see a light in the kitchen —

“Will?”

The voice startles her, and it takes her a moment to figure out it’s coming from the tall silhouetted form in the doorway.

“It’s Abigail,” she says, her voice hoarse.

Hannibal pauses in his place for a moment and then slips out of the light as he approaches the stair landing like an untethered shadow. Due to distance and then lack of light, Abigail cannot read his expression. “Why are you still awake, at this hour?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” she replies.

A slight movement in the dark: Hannibal cocking his head, considering. Then: “Come downstairs, Abigail.” He extends his hand, the light from the kitchen casting faint light on his skin. “I’ll show you what I’ve been working on.”

After a moment, Abigail lets one hand fall from the railing, but keeps a tight grip on it with the other as she slowly descends. She takes Hannibal’s hand, more out of habit than any other impulse, but keeps her cautious pace down the stairs. Her hand is still in his as they approach the table, cleared of dinner trappings.

Abigail smells something then; it reminds her a bit of toasted marshmallows, but given Hannibal’s likely distaste for mass-produced foods, it is unlikely that it is marshmallows. “Are you cooking?” she asks, surprised. _Can’t sleep, so he cooks..._

Hannibal pauses halfway through pulling out one of the chairs. “Yes,” he finally says after a long silence. He gestures to the seat. “I’ll bring it out for you.”

Confused curiosity creeping in, Abigail sits in the chair and peers after him as he retreats into the kitchen. Hannibal returns shortly, balancing a stack of plates with forks in one hand and a serving plate with some sort of white amorphous mass in the center and a knife on the edge.

 _Well, it_ looks _like a bag of melted marshmallows._ “What is it?”

“Pavlova.” Hannibal carefully sets his burdens down on the table, and Abigail can see now that the dish is less of a messy blob and more of a cake with delicate, swirling peaks, topped with dark red globes and a sugary-looking syrup. “Garnished with honey and pomegranate juice and seeds.” He glances at her, almost expectantly.

It takes a moment for Abigail to realize that he is waiting for her to respond — though to _what_ , she has no idea. “I — I’ve never had pavlova,” she says lamely. “It looks good, though.”

The ends of Hannibal’s mouth curl up for a moment, then slacken again. “Would you like to have some?” he asked, his light tone at odds with his distant look.

The dryness in her throat persists, but she ignores it. “Ah — yes. Yes, I would.”

Taking up the knife, Hannibal slices into the pavlova with a faint crunching of the outer shell. Abigail watches as he cuts two small pieces and distributes them to the plates. There is a third plate and fork left over, but she doesn’t mention it.

“Did you stay up late as well?” Hannibal slides one of the plates to her, seating himself at the place setting with the other plate.

Abigail is taken aback by the unusual directness. “Not really,” she says.

Hannibal tilts his head, waiting for further explanation.

She sighs. “I tried to sleep,” she says quietly, “but — I had nightmares.”

His gaze is steady. “About what?”

“You.” Abigail stares down at her plate, not reaching for her fork. “And Will.” The pomegranate juice running down the sides and staining the pristine whiteness of the pavlova makes her want to reach for her throat again, for a wound that should be closed by now, but she resists the urge. “All of us.”

Hannibal’s hand comes to rest over hers, startling her into meeting his eyes. “Tell me about them.”

Abigail swallows. She wants — no, _needs_ — so desperately to talk to someone, _anyone_ — and she can’t summon the effort to be casually dishonest right now.

“I died.” Her voice is no more than a whisper. “Over and over and _over_ again. In my kitchen, in my living room, in my dad’s cabin, in your kitchen. My dad, Nick Boyle, Will, you —” Her throat is suddenly even more hoarse than before, and she rips her hand out from underneath his to clutch at her neck. “They all had _knives_ —”

“Abigail.” Hannibal reaches for her again and takes her other hand, fingertips pressing into her knuckles.

“There was so much _blood_.” It’s all pouring out now, and she keeps desperately rubbing at her throat. “It wouldn’t stop. Will wrapped his hands around my neck, but it just kept spilling and spilling all over the floor and I — I couldn’t _breathe._ I was screaming, but I couldn’t hear myself over the roar of it flooding all over the floor —”

“Abigail.” His voice is even, but unusually quiet.

“You just _watched_.” Her eyes are wet and hot, and she squeezes them shut and let the tears fall. “You stood over us with a knife in your hand and you watched us die.”

The lines in Hannibal’s brow deepen. “Was Will injured, in your nightmare?”

“I don’t know,” she confesses, her voice breaking. “The blood — it was _everywhere_ — on my neck, on my hands, on my clothes, in my mouth, in my lungs —” Her breaths are shallow, gasping, but somehow she manages to get the words out. “I drowned. Will drowned. _You didn’t_.”

For a moment, there is no sound but her shuddering, uneven breathing, no movement but her frantic rubbing of the dry, healed scar on her neck. Then Hannibal leans over from his chair and slides his other hand around to her back, pulling her close. Abigail collapses against him, burying her face in his chest and trying to stem her crying.

Hannibal speaks then. “Is this the first time you’ve had this particular nightmare?” He lets go of her hand and threads his fingers through her disheveled hair, cradling her head almost tenderly.

“No.” Abigail tries not to think about the fact that his hands are so very close to her neck and that there’s a knife on the table less than a foot away. “Not — never this bad, though.”

Hannibal hums thoughtfully, his fingers still working out the tangles in her hair while his other hand presses between her shoulderblades.

“It — it just makes me think,” she continues, her voice still shaking. “About how things could have gone — almost _did_ go. In some other world.”

“We can only see the future when we look back on the past.” Hannibal’s low voice vibrates through his chest, against her skull. “With our old aches and regrets, we piece together versions of the future as it might have been, had we done one small thing differently.”

 _Or if someone else had changed their mind,_ Abigail thinks, a chill running through her. _If Hannibal hadn’t called my house — if Will hadn’t called Hannibal’s house —_

“You wonder where else you would be, if not here.” Hannibal’s voice interrupts her thoughts. “ _Who_ else you would be, if not who you are in this moment.”

“I’d be dead.” Her words come out flat. “Just like my dad’s victims.” The faces from her last eight passports, mirrored in TattleCrime.com photo galleries, rise to the surface of her mind. “Or yours.”

Hannibal pulls back at that, but his hands remain on her shoulders as he looks at her with frightening directness. “You may bear resemblance to them, but are no victim, Abigail,” he says firmly. “You are a survivor.”

“I don’t want to survive anymore.” Abigail surprises herself with her own vehemence. “I don’t want to keep running. I don’t want to wonder what horrors tomorrow has in store for me. I want to _live._ ”

Hannibal’s hands slowly fall away from her shoulders, and his gaze becomes distant and melancholy again. “Spoken just like her,” he murmurs, almost to himself.

Abigail frowns, surprised at his reaction. “Like who?”

“Mischa.” The name is said softly, reverently, but not without pain. “My sister.” In the shadows cast by the light from the kitchen, Hannibal suddenly looks much older and more weary.

 _More human_ , Abigail thinks, and despite herself, something twinges in her heart.

“I’m — I’m just me,” she finally says cautiously. “In the here and now. Just Abigail. Not Mischa.” _You can’t replace a human being, not really. My father learned that eight times over._

_And no one can change the past._

_Not even Hannibal._

Hannibal raises his gaze to her, and his eyes are black and without light in the dim house. For a heartstopping moment, she fears she said something out of line.

“You are not,” he agrees after a moment, his tone almost companionable. “But you and Will have taken up her space in the world.” He pauses, his eyes closing briefly. “And it is a very dear space.”

All Abigail can do is stare at him in stunned silence. The look on Hannibal’s face is peculiar and unexpected, and it takes her a few seconds to recognize it as affection.

It takes another second for her to recognize that his gaze has shifted up above her head, and she twists her body in her seat to see what he’s looking at.

Will, clad only in an undershirt and pajama shorts, is slowly descending the stairs. He looks as though he just woke up; his hair is even more wildly unkempt than usual and he is squinting against the square of light emanating from the kitchen.

Abigail can feel Hannibal watching as intensely as she is as Will pauses at the foot of the stairs, shifting his weight from one leg to the other as his feet curl and stretch. “Is something — _burning_?” he finally asks.

Hannibal’s mouth flattens in annoyance, but his eyes remain warm. “I was baking dessert,” he says. “You may have some, if you like.”

Abigail suddenly remembers the slice of uneaten pavlova in front of her. Picking up her fork, she carves off a small piece and brings it to her mouth. Despite the crisp shell, the dessert is surprisingly light and moist within, with an extra tang from the pomegranate juice and a hint of sweetness from the honey.

“It’s delicious,” she comments, half to Hannibal and half to Will. (Mercifully, Hannibal is far too occupied with gazing at Will to chide her for speaking with her mouth full.)

Will approaches the table, drawing out a chair and sitting down. “Might as well have some, then,” he says. Abigail sees his eyes dart to the extra plate, but he, like her, does not comment on it. “Would be a shame not to.”

Hannibal looks away from Will long enough to stand up, cut another slice of pavlova, and place it on the lonely third plate. Picking up the third fork and balancing it on the edge of the plate, he makes to hand it to Will.

“Hannibal.”

Hannibal pauses. It might be just her imagination, but Abigail swears that the plate of pavlova is shaking in his outstretched hand.

Will chews on his lower lip, his expression more open and anxious than she’s ever seen it. “I forgive you,” he says simply.

It’s no longer Abigail’s imagination making Hannibal’s hand shake as he sets the plate back down on the table and sinks into his seat. He is unabashedly staring at Will now, stunned and awed and overwhelmed, most of all. From her seat, at once so close and so far from the confrontation, it is like watching a colossus collapse.

“Just —” Will exhales heavily, something of his usual demeanor returning as he looks Hannibal right in the eye, demanding his attention. “Don’t bait what’s already after us. For once in your life, rein in your goddamn curiosity.”

Hannibal’s eyes widen for a moment, and his warring emotions solidify into something more amused. “I have never placed you in the path of a danger I did not think you could defeat,” he says. “I have always had every confidence in you and Abigail.”

“Then let us have confidence in _you_.” Will leans forward, deliberately planting his elbows on the table. “You want me to trust you again, you have to earn it.”

Hannibal tilts his head. “You assume that I trust you.” It is less incredulous and more wondering.

“I don’t have to assume,” Will says. “And if you don’t now… you want to.”

The brief flicker of Hannibal’s eyelids closing, shielding himself from Will’s protracted gaze, is more than enough of an answer.

“We can hide from Mason — hell, we _need_ to hide from Mason.” Will’s voice is quieter now, but no less direct. “But don’t hide from us. I —” he swallows “— I don’t want you to.”

Hannibal looks back up at those words. A furtive, but genuine smile is on his lips, and he no longer looks like the dejected, time-worn man of a few minutes ago. After a moment, Will returns the smile, the corners of his mouth slightly lopsided.

Something flutters in Abigail’s chest at the sight, but it doesn’t feel like the fear that wracked her this night — nowhere near it.

Hannibal breaks the silence. “You should eat what you can,” he says, gesturing to the pavlova before Will. “Pavlova is difficult to preserve.”

Will raises his eyebrows. “As opposed to...?”

Hannibal sighs. “Eat, Will.”

Turning her attention back to her own plate, Abigail helps herself to another corner of the pavlova, and then another. It is deceptively addicting for such an unassuming-looking dish.

Taking up his fork, Will scrapes some of the pomegranate seeds off the top of the dessert. “Some very particular symbolic associations, pomegranate,” he comments. “Especially the seeds.”

“Ovid’s Proserpine eats unthinking, unknowing of the consequences of her meal.” Hannibal is holding his fork, but he has not eaten any of his own creation. “Seven seeds become seven months languishing in the kingdom of Dis.”

“‘Languishing’?” Will echoes pointedly.

“To Ovid, Persephone lost what little she had.” Hannibal spears the tip of his slice of pavlova and holds it up. “But to the Greeks, Persephone gained everything in this world — and the next.”

Will is silent for a moment, contemplating the seeds balanced on the tines of his fork. Then he raises the seeds to his mouth, chews them, and swallows them, never breaking eye contact with Hannibal. “To the next world, then,” he says.

Hannibal’s eyes gleam, his pupils suddenly seeming large even in the low light of the dining room. “To the next,” he agrees. He, too, eats.

Abigail looks down at her plate, at the untouched pomegranate seeds on the top of her pavlova. Slowly putting down her fork, she opts to pick up the largest of the seeds between her fingers and place it on her tongue. She can’t help thinking that Hannibal was right: it tastes like something forbidden, something fated.

And the three of them sit and eat at the dining room table in the dark for the longest time, bound in silent — but less strained — communion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Pavlova](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pavlova_\(food\)) is a real dessert. I've never had it, but [this recipe](http://www.bhg.com/recipe/pomegranate-pavlova-with-pistachios-and-honey/) I found while Googling something along the lines of "pretentious pomegranate desserts" looks really delicious.
> 
> I will admit to stealing Abigail's nightmare straight from the canon events of "Mizumono" (and all the other times she nearly dies IRL / dies in Will's crime reconstructions or encephalitis-induced hallucinations. Poor girl has a lot of brushes with death).
> 
> In case you haven't realized it already, I am embarrassingly obsessed with the myth of Hades and Persephone, and [edits](http://brunetteauthorette99.tumblr.com/post/131407044509/hannigram-au-hades-persephone-i-have-loved-you) [like](http://brunetteauthorette99.tumblr.com/post/144400828488/wickedastardly-hannibal-au-hades) [these](http://brunetteauthorette99.tumblr.com/post/146869200352/wickedastardly-walk-the-same-tale-over-and) only hasten my imminent death from maximum mythological parallels. (If you ask me about Achilles and Patroclus parallels, expect me to shriek for five or so minutes and then drop dead.) You can find out more about the somewhat suggestive symbolism behind pomegranates [here](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1118911/). ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
> 
> ... I _will_ , however, have to request that you not ask me about the empowerment of the Homeric Hymns' Persephone versus that of Ovid's Proserpine, because I already wrote a paper last semester on the subject, and I think that fourteen pages is a bit much to squeeze into an AO3 comment.


	11. EPILOGUE: Good Bones

****Abigail wakes with the sun in her eyes and a mouth dry with sugared sweetness. Groaning, she sits up, back turned to the windows, and rubs her screwed-shut eyes, faint blotches blinking through her vision. _Curtains_ , she thinks, adding the item to her shopping list for her room.

Her. Room. Two words that, together, seemed more fixed and weighty than they had been last night.

Turning over onto her other side, she looks at the — _her_ room, _really_ looks at it and idly thinks about what it could be. The walls are white, just waiting for a coat of paint. The windows are large and there are enough of them to give her plenty of natural light during the day; some kind of lamp, for reading or journaling in the evenings, could be useful, though. For those activities, she’d want a desk, or at least some kind of table she could sit at, whether on a chair or on the floor. But however lovely the wooden floors look, they’d be cold on her feet in the mornings; she’d want a rug, a big one.

Abigail realizes then that she’s smiling. _Is that all I’ve been looking for?_ she thinks, laughing at herself, but not unkindly. _A “room of my own”?_

( _If_ that _was all you wanted, Abby,_ the nasty little voice in her head says smugly, but quieter than before, _you could have been very happy at Port Haven_. _Or a_ real _mental institution._ )

She swallows her smile at the truth of it. Her mouth is still dry with the memory of sugar, and it calls out for water.

Abigail remembers the pavlova from last night, how the pomegranate sauce and seeds congealed in her mouth with the airy pastry: light like a dream, but bitter enough to be reality. Yet the honey gave it lasting sweetness.

She’d eaten more than just that slice, and she regains her grin at the memory of her shameless gluttony. Two, nearly three slices later, and she couldn’t even recall her nightmares within and outside of her head. But she remembers Will and Hannibal eating at the table on either side of her — maybe not as ravenously as her, but it seemed like they’d enjoyed it. Or, at the very least, each other’s company. They kept as silent as they had throughout most of their travels, but this silence was comfortable, familiar: like they had volumes to say to each other, but had already said it a hundred times before.

(After cleaning up her dish, she’d left, in the hopes that maybe they would talk if she wasn’t there. She’d placed her hand on Will’s shoulder as she bade him good-night, and he’d tensed for an instant before reaching up and patting it. The gesture was still awkward, but it felt so more because of disuse than abnormality.)

The sun shines directly on her phone screen, bouncing light into her eyes, and Abigail grabs it: partly to prevent herself from going blind and partly to check the time. It’s a little after nine in the morning; if Hannibal was up ( _I’d be surprised if he was, with how late he was up last night baking… and moping_ _)_ , he’d surely be preparing breakfast.

The growling of her stomach makes her decision for her. Rising from her bed, Abigail forages through the pile by her emptied suitcase and hastily changes into a pair of jeans stiff with newness and a shirt that’s less wrinkled than some of the others on the floor. _Definitely need some hangers_ , she reminds herself, untangling the worn straps of her bra. _And some more furniture for storage in general._

Scrabbling for some socks, her fingers brush over hard edges. Frowning in surprise, she pushes away what’s covering it — a button-down in desperate need of ironing, two scarves she’d bought back in Barcelona, the socks she’d been looking for — and finds not one, but _two_ “it”s: an anthology of women’s writing with a peacock feather on the cover and a brown spiral-bound notebook with worn edges.

Abigail exhales, sitting back on her heels. She’d nearly forgotten she’d taken her Port Haven journal with her, and she’d entirely forgotten about the book Dr. Bloom had half-given, half-left to her.

( _She_ was another person that Abigail didn’t think about much any more, but now she wonders how her first doctor is coping with everything — how Dr. Bloom remembers her, dead girl that she is — how she remembers Hannibal and Will. Abigail thinks that the three of them were friends once, maybe more, but she was never sure of where they were with each other.)

Putting the anthology back on the floor, Abigail tentatively cracks open her old journal. A newspaper clipping falls from between the cover and the first page, and she picks it up as if it were something fragile and dead. The _Sun Current_ headline shouts “FBI BRINGS DOWN ‘MINNESOTA SHRIKE’ IN BLOOMINGTON BLOODBATH.” The date is nearly six months ago.

Abigail stares at it for a moment. Six months since Garret Jacob Hobbs — the man she once called “father” — cut Louise Hobbs’s throat and tried to do the same to her. Six months since Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham — the men who closest resemble her “fathers” now — saved her life and damned her life with a telephone call and nine bullets. Six months since her already tipping world turned completely upside-down.

In some ways, it still is. And it’ll stay that way for the rest of her life.

 _But I’m not falling anymore,_ Abigail thinks, closing her journal and laying it on the anthology. _And I’m not hanging on, either._

_I’ve climbed up._

Closing her eyes and shutting herself off from the lurid headline, Abigail pinches the paper between her fingers and tears it, then folds it in half and tears it again. She keeps going until all that’s left is newspaper confetti. Clenching the remnants of the clipping and walking to the bathroom, she doesn’t hesitate before opening her hand and letting the shredded paper fall into the toilet. Then she flushes, and the last tangible evidence of that bloody day is gone for good.

Abigail washes her hands in the sink and then examines herself in the mirror. Besides a slight puffiness around her eyes, she looks reasonably well-rested and not at all distressed. In fact, she looks close to calm.

Returning to her room, she grabs the socks and pulls them on. One of the scarves she’d uncovered matches her shirt, but she leaves without winding it around her neck. _I don’t need to hide,_ she thinks as she steps out into the hallway. _Not here._

Abigail heads for the stairs, noting that the door across the hallway is still closed. She descends the stairs, but stops at the landing.

Will is at the dining room table, dressed in slacks and a long-sleeved shirt with his hair just as messy as it had been last night. He has a cup of coffee cradled between his hands and he’s watching Hannibal as he pours an egg-and-vegetable mixture into the frying pan on the stove. Aware of his audience, Hannibal stirs the mixture and then flips it, folding it into an omelet with a single deft motion.

Will rolls his eyes at the theatricality of it, but there’s a slight, soft smile on his face: for Hannibal’s performance in the kitchen, for the chef himself, or possibly, for both. Abigail thinks that Will’s smiles are coming a little easier now, and she’s grateful for it.

Hannibal emerges from the kitchen, a plate in each hand. As he sets his and Will’s places at the table, he sees Abigail; his gaze is warm as he beckons her over. As she approaches and sits, she thinks that Hannibal seems more relaxed and contented than she has ever seen him before. It’ll be a while before she’s wholly grateful for that manner instead of deeply worried because of it, but she’s got a while to work on that particular response.

“My apologies, Abigail; I thought you were still in bed,” Hannibal is saying as he slides his plate over to her. “I will join you in a moment.” With a smile and a squeeze of Will’s shoulder — a new gesture from him, yet so easy and intimate — he turns and returns to the kitchen.

The sun streams in through the seaward windows and paints the dark wood of the table and the white of the china in brilliant light. Abigail looks out those windows for a moment, at the blueness of the glittering sea and the glowing sky. In her mind’s eye, she sees them wandering down on the strand, out on the open water in a boat of Will’s own, on the porch watching the sun setting after dinner, around this table for meal after meal: at rest, at peace.

 _I see family_ , she’d whispered once at Hannibal’s table before, when her mind was not wholly her own. But her mind is unclouded now, clear as the morning the three of them have woken up to, and she can truly glimpse what she'd only grasped at before.

 _I could make something of this,_ she decides, turning knife and fork to her omelet.

We _could make something of this._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are, at the end of this fic... for the moment. I say "for the moment" because, after a forced hiatus due to college, I reread the whole thing after I rewatched Season 2 (and dragged another dear friend into _Hannibal_ hell in the process) and I found that the previous chapter was... actually a pretty good place for this fic to end. It was not at all how I thought this fic would end, but outlines are never really set in stone, are they?
> 
> The other reason I say "for the moment" because while this fic may be wrapped up, there's still more for me to write in this particular Season 3 AU that I first started constructing almost a year ago. Despite the fact that I am overwhelmed with academics, work, theatre, and study abroad fuckery, I'm planning a couple of drabbles (that will definitely be a little fluffier and less angst-ridden than this) and then something that I am hesitantly calling a one-shot that will wrap up that pesky Mason problem. So definitely stay tuned, but I wouldn't anticipate anything for a while yet because I'm also wrapping up an incredibly long and in-depth paper about "Bluebeard" motifs in _Hannibal_ for one of my college classes. (The writing just never stops!)
> 
> I leave you with two final links: one to [a third _Hannibal_ fanmix dedicated solely to this fic](http://8tracks.com/turwaithi3l/the-hinges-of-human-sympathies), and one to the wonderfully, wryly heartbreaking poem ["Good Bones" by Maggie Smith](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/89897) that gave the epilogue its title. I thought it fit especially well with the bittersweet nature of the story.
> 
> As always: thank you to all of the readers, reviewers, kudo-givers, lurkers, and everyone else who made this fic a joy to write. This fandom is fantastic and I owe you my sincerest gratitude and awe. (And if any of you are going to Behold the Red Dragon Con 3 in February, I'll see you there!)
> 
> _**BrunetteAuthorette99**_


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